I'd End My Days With You in a Hail of Bullets
by BloodForMyBreakfast
Summary: Um...Frerard, obviously. Is it obvious? I don't know... Anyway, they're at high school. It's oh-so-imaginative: Gerard is bullied and Frank moves to town, they fall for each other and don't realise it, and...ugh. The same as every other ordinary fanfic. Anyway, I'm wasting my life writing it, so it's only polite of you to waste yours reading it:3
1. Hello Angel

**I: Hello Angel**

**(GPOV)**

It's dark for dawn; still almost pitch black: the sky a dead, starless navy and the sidewalk haunted by deep purple phantoms cast by streetlamps and houses and trees. I trudge slowly along the road, my sleek boots trailing reluctantly behind me as I wander home. I'm done for: really, truly done for.

"Mikey?" I hiss, trying to attract his attention quietly, so I don't wake my parents, but he doesn't hear. His window is shut, locked, probably. Great. I look for a stone to throw at the pane, but can only find a discarded needle, half-empty cans littered carelessly and half a brick. None of the available items seem suitable for Mikey-waking that doesn't involve much window-smashing. "Mikey!" I cry again, louder this time. No response.

What do I do now, then? I don't have my keys, Mikey can't let me in, and if I wake my parents they'll know I was out for so long. I need to get inside the house before they wake up. But how? No one I know of has a spare set of keys (other than my grandma, and she lives out of state) and we don't keep an extra set underneath a plant pot or anything outside, and it'd be too noisy anyway if I tried to unlock the door through the letterbox. So I'm stuck here. Outside. At three minutes past one am. Alone. Drunk (well, ish).

Well, I have to get back into the house somehow. Don't I? I could text Mikey, but he hardly ever has his phone on. Still, it's worth a shot – I don't have any other options for getting back in.

Surprisingly, he replies, though something seems off about him. I mull over what could be wrong with him, but can't think of anything at all. No exams, no relationship, and he gets along with mom and dad pretty well most of the time, so nothing I'm aware of could have really stressed him out. He gets depressed just like I do – it's genetic; our brains just don't _work_ right – but he doesn't normally take that out on me.

**G: Let me in!**

**M: Where ru?**

**G: Outside the front door**

**M: Why?**

**G: That's usually the way I get into the house**

**M: Where r your keys?**

**G: Forgot them**

**M: Why?**

**G: Can't u just let me in?**

**M: Where hv u been?**

**G: Just out. Into town**

**M: You left at 1 PM. U've been gone 12 hrs**

**G: I went shopping w/ Ray. Then I went out. Just let me in**

**M: Why don't you knock?**

**G: Bcos mom and dad'll hear me**

**M: Hv u been out with fags?**

**G: WHAT?**

**M: Hv u been out with fags again? I won't have a faggot under this roof**

This isn't right. Mikey's bi. Mikey is not homophobic. Mikey never uses that word. This isn't Mikey, I realise, too late. I'm not talking to Mikey. Someone else has his phone. Only one person talks to me like this.

**G: Dad?**

**M: Get out**

**G: Dad, let me in**

**M: Leave. Now**

**G: Please!**

**M: Go away. Ur not wanted here**

_Think, Gerard_. I could go to Ray's house. But, wait. The only reason I hadn't slept at his anyway was because he's at his girlfriend's place. So I can't go there. Bob's? He's out of town, I remember. But his sister's still home, she's cool, I've met her a couple of times. Since I don't really have any other friends, I decide it's pretty much the only place I can go. Ashley it is, then.

It's a whole two-point-six-three miles (don't ask how I know that) to Bob's house, but the buses have stopped running by now, so I have to walk the distance. I consider getting a taxi, because it's too cold and too dark and too late, plus all around me is mist, but I only have ten dollars on me, and I don't know if that will be enough. So I lumber along morosely, feet dragging anxiously. What if she's not awake? Not in? Doesn't want me there? Where will I go then? I don't have anyone else!

I tell myself I can't think like that, I have to be positive. But positive doesn't suit me: I'm always down. Well, nearly always. I fish around in my coat pockets until I locate my iPod and headphones, and douse myself in music in an attempt to block out my awful thoughts. Astro Zombies manages to kill the pessimism, but I can't focus on anything else, either. After I've been walking for about twenty minutes, I'm half way there, and I text Ashley to let her know. I'm scared she'll be mad if I wake her up, but I need her to be awake when I get there. I'm not willing to throw rocks at someone _else's_ house.

While I struggle to shove my cell back in my pocket and shield myself from the heavy rain that has just begun to fall, seemingly only upon me, I hear a loud noise and look up. When I say loud, I mean _loud_. It's hard to imagine anything I'd be able to hear over the deafening drum beat pulsating from my iPod, but I hear the sound ear-shatteringly loud and clear. The ground seems to vibrate beneath my feet, and I feel terror wash over me, catch the scent of fear and smoke in the air. I stop walking completely, shaking. No. No, it can't be. Can it?

Sure enough, a short but somehow strangely gangly guy appears from behind the 7/11, dressed in a black raincoat with dark, shadowy eyes that intimidate the shit outta me. No. No, it can't be. It can't be! Yet what is he grasping tight in his hand? Something cold and metallic, choking on an endless stream of smoke. No, no, no. Please, no.

The guy has a gun. And I'm the only one around here.

Terrified, I turn to glance as discretely as possible behind me. There is no one there. For a second, I'm sure I see a small, quick form disappear behind a dustbin, but in a second the silhouette has vanished along with all proof. And all hope. No, no. There's no one else here. I'm gonna die.

He's gonna shoot me. I'm gonna die.

_I'm gonna die._

The words sink into my head slowly, like a heavy grey cloud looming inside my brain. In retaliation, I petrify, turn to stone, my legs leaden with fear. I cannot move. I can't run. No sound can be uttered; I can't scream. How can I fight him off? He might be short, but he sure looks hard. He could kill me with his bare hands, I bet. And he's the one with the fucking gun.

Shit. I'm going to die.

"Hello?" a deep, dark, disturbing voice calls; I guess it comes from the gun wielder. I don't reply. It's not that I'm trying to avoid detection – I know he's already seen me – but my airway seems to have swollen, closed in on itself like walls in a horror movie so that I can't speak or breathe or even operate anymore. My entire body has shut down: I'm useless, helpless. I wonder if anyone will come to my funeral, if anyone will miss me. How long will it be before they notice I'm gone? Hours, weeks, months? Will anyone notice? Will anyone care?

"Hell-o-o?" He strings the word out this time, like a lullaby. Or a death lament.

No reply.

Footsteps, he's walking forwards, I hear him. A ringtone. Green Day. My ringtone. Ashley? Maybe she's calling me. Or Mikey may have discovered his cell and the messages from dad. Or mom. What does it matter? I'll be dead soon anyway. Maybe they'll feel bad then.

Now I'm busted for sure. I hear him stop, doesn't start walking again until the 15 second snippet of Basket Case stops. Then more footsteps. Faster. Running, almost. He jogs up to me, heavy feet pounding on the floor like an irregular heartbeat fading out. How ironic.

"I know you're there," he whispers, and the voice grows louder and more sinister as it gets closer. The sound is not a pleasant whoosh, but like the shrill murmur of wind through autumn leaves. I cringe. My knees tremble, legs turn to jelly, feet fail. Heart throbbing loud, making its dying presence more and more obvious, I fall to the floor like a weak little girl. The way my chest aches, I'm surprised he can't see my heart thump out of my chest in the dark, like a cartoon. There's nothing comical or childish about this, though; just a murmur of death and pain and grief to come. Still, who will grieve me? No one, surely. Only my brother. Ray, maybe, and Bob. Ashley? My parents might feel guilty, if they're capable of such an emotion – if they have a conscience between them. Sometimes I don't think they do.

Another footstep, and he's not twelve inches away from me. I can smell him: the stench of corndogs and sweat and alcohol and something else – gunpowder, it must be – engulf me, wrapping around me like a tornado of a fatal fire.

His arm raises, the gun level to my head. Another step, and the cool metal presses against my temple. _No, no, please, no._

Yes.

My entire body radiates a frightened cold sweat and I can't escape the feeling that I am going to die here, alone, with no one to say goodbye, no one to hold me, love me, miss me. What a waste of life, I think. What a waste of death. Then I realise that the emotion is not a feeling at all, but a grim, gritty reality. This is my life. My death. My waste of breath.

"What did you see?" the man demands aggressively – aggressive? Of course! Of course, how obvious, it's a no-brainer. He's holding a fucking gun, for fuck's sake. Of course he's fucking aggressive. Of fucking course.

"N-n-nothing," I stutter quietly to the ground, confused. What is he talking about? I saw nothing, heard only a gunshot. Realisation dawns on me. The first gunshot – it was lethal. This man stood in front of me, he's a murderer. He just killed someone. And he thinks I saw. He's clearing his tracks, burning the evidence. Unfortunately, I _am_ the evidence. And he won't believe me when I say I didn't see. I'm proof, an eyewitness, he thinks. I need destroying. How fortunate for him no one will miss me.

"Don't lie to me." I'm totally immobilised: can't breathe, speak, stand, run, scream, cry, plead, pray. I can't even think. I am nothing, dead already. Maybe it won't make any difference when he shoots me. It'll just be the same for me, and probably everyone else. I'm scared though. So fucking scared.

I don't answer him, purely because I can't. Besides, what would I say? He's not the kind of person one can negotiate with. You can't talk yourself out of being shot by someone who thinks you are the key to them going to or not going to jail. He'll get away, I know it. I'm scared tonight isn't the first time he's killed. I'm just another nameless, faceless, meaningless victim. Just another statistic: a functioning organism to society, a death to a serial killer. No one will miss me, no one will care. No tears to be shed.

Surely that's not true. Surely Mikey will cry, at the least.

Won't he?

"Any last words?" the guy asks, but I can't find my voice inside myself. I don't think I have one anymore, I think I'm basically dead already. A corpse with unblinking eyes and a stationery chest, but a rapidly beating heart. The only thing proving my existence is the pathetic, pounding muscle lurking timidly behind my ribcage, soon to be silenced.

_Pull the trigger, get it over with._ But he doesn't. Something stops him. What?

I hear a noise, one that isn't my own fading heartbeat or his drunken, dense breaths, or a night owl hooting or a trigger being dragged backwards. Metal scattering. Footsteps. Shouting.

"No!"

"Stop!"

"Don't touch him!"

"I'll kill you!"

The man runs. I don't realise it, but there's no gun against my head. The gun has been dropped, abandoned on the ground, left in the shadow of the escaped killer.

What?

He's gone?

_He's gone!_

More pounding footsteps, and reality hits me hard. Another man is here. Stronger, bigger than the first murderer? The footsteps sound light, but it's possible, I assume. Why else would he have left? So my rescuer is another intimidating guy. He's going to kill me instead. Man, has someone got it in for me. Maybe I should have believed in God. Maybe this is punishment.

"Hello?" How odd. This high but distinctly male voice is soft, gentle...kind? A kind murderer? No, it can't be. Maybe I'm hallucinating, driven insane by the terror. That must be it. I can't be hearing this.

His footsteps fade, and I sense a presence behind my shrunken, quivering form. My heart still rockets like a mouse's humming, but my breath has returned. I can't breathe, though. It's like an asthma attack I once saw Jared McCracken have in Junior High. My lungs won't cooperate. Their reluctance is just as terrifying as the person behind me.

"Hello? Are you...are you okay? I'm Frank. I...I...Should I call an ambulance? I just...I'm so..." his voice is as rushed as mine would be if I could speak; he's breathless. How come? Why would this monster be scared? Is he a monster? Oh, but he must be. Right?

"I'm sorry!" he cries, though I'm not sure who he shouts to. "I'm sorry, I am. I'm just...I'm...I'm s-scared. I shouldn't have hidden, but I-I thought he was going to k-k-k-kill...kill me, and I-I panicked and I-I-I..."

No. This can't be real. I...I'm not hearing this. Unless...maybe I'm already dead. Maybe this is an angel, come to collect me. Rather forgiving of him, seeing as I was never really religious. I let myself fall back into the road, tears falling freely down my snowy cold cheeks.

"Oh, shit. Shit, shit, shit." A hot-cold-dry hand on my boiling-freezing-soaked forehead. Rough fingers on smooth wet cheeks, brushing away icy tears. Firm arms around my weightless, cloud-filled head, supporting it. I appear to be not resting on the hard tarmac anymore, but in his lap. This must be an angel. No one is so kind.

"Hello? Can you hear me?"

As well as being bemused, I'm reassured by this man's actions, and I manage to muster a slight, weak nod. His breathing slows, returns to an almost normal pace, and I feel my heart do the same, but it still hurts me to breathe. I find I can breathe, though. My lungs aren't conspiring against me anymore; my body's mutiny has failed.

"Oh, God. Thank God. What's your name?"

I pant for a while before I answer. "Gee."

"Gee?" I nod faintly so he knows he's got it right, but it hurts to move. I love the way he pronounces the nickname, the soft 'j' sound and the drawn-out 'e'. His accent is amazing. "Well, I'm Frank, like I said. Where do you live?" But I just shake my head in denial; he seems to understand. "Well, okay. I'll...I'll take you back to my place, I guess. Or the hospital. I...I don't...Do you want to go to the hospital? I think you should, but..."

Is he worried about my health insurance? Does he think I'm homeless? _Am_ I homeless? I don't want to go the hospital though, so I shake my head, 'no', again. It still hurts to move, speak, but it's getting gradually easier. Maybe by tomorrow I'll be okay.

"Okay, then. Well, I'll just take you back to my house. Can you stand up?" He helps me to my feet, supporting most of my body weight, and keeps both his arms around me, even when I'm upright. I feel lightheaded, dizzy, like I might faint at any moment. Frank is literally tiny, but he seems strong. In the dark of the early morning streetlight glow, I see his has a lip and nose ring, collar-length black hair and thick eyelashes. He's kinda cute. But...no. There's no way he'd be gay. No way he'd like me, even if he was. So I just lean on him and close my eyes, wishing I could disappear into the night time sky like a faded ghost.

"C'mon, Gee," he whispers, and takes a step forwards. All I have to do is move my feet; he's holding most of my body weight so I can't really count it as walking on my behalf. I rest my head on his shoulder and breathe in deeply, trying to regain half my composure. He smells good. _Alive_. I match my breaths to his shockingly calm ones, and soon my chest is less tight and painful. I can speak.

"F-Frank?" I ask, still a little breathless, lifting my head to squint at his shaded face.

"What is it? Do you feel okay?" His voice is laced with sweet concern, and the shock is like lip-gloss shooting through my veins. I'm surprised, and surprised at how surprised I am, which is a little weird.

"Why are you being so nice to me?"

He hesitates, I assume while he considers his answer. Then he says, "Wouldn't you do the same?"

I pause now, honestly thinking about it. "I don't know. I'd like to think I would." And then I'm quiet, because I'm hurt at my realisation that maybe I wouldn't. Would I? How good am I? I'd definitely help someone in my position, but Frank scared the killer away, somehow. How did he do that? Would I have been able to do it? God, I hope I would.

Frank meets the silence contentedly, and doesn't speak again until five minutes later, when we reach a row of New-England-esque houses. "It's just here," he breathes, and lets go of me for a second to unlock the door and lead us both inside. In the midnight light, I make a note of the house number. 31.

"Come on," he says, and grabs my hand unthinkingly to pull me up the stairs. Without the light on, it's hard to grasp what the house looks like, but it smells nice. Like Christmas: cinnamon and pine and black cherry and a sense of tangible excitement. I wonder why this house is excited, happy. Do Frank's parents hate him? I doubt it. I don't see how anyone could hate this small, beautiful, selfless person. How old is he? Around fifteen, sixteen, twenty? In the dark, I'd guess he's about sixteen. I'm eighteen.

In his room, he switches on the light, and I look around hazily, growing weak like I haven't eaten for days. When was the last time I ate? It must be just before 3 AM now, which makes it...Sunday, right? I didn't eat yesterday, apart from coffee in Starbucks with Ray. So maybe it was Friday dinner...Friday lunch. I had cheese on toast. It was burned.

Fuck, I'm hungry.

Frank's room is amazing, frankly (no pun intended, I swear). The walls are painted bright orange, which looks awesome with the black canvases and posters littering them. His taste in art is phenomenal: I really love it. Half of my main inspirations are right up there, and his music taste is flawless, too: a Misfits poster, a Green Day one, U2 and Pulp and Smashing Pumpkins and the Smiths, even. The rest of his room is almost entirely black: from the curtains to the furniture to the books on his shelf (there are tons, by the way) to the bedding. I collapse onto his bed, and wonder as he climbs in beside me, kicking off his shoes – something I don't have the energy to do myself, but my feet dangle off the end of the bed anyway, since my head doesn't rest on the pillow, but half way down the mattress – if he'd let me be here if he knew. Surely he wouldn't sleep in the same bed as a faggot?

"Do you want to borrow pyjamas?" he enquires softly, but I'm asleep before he's even finished the sentence.


	2. A Bullet Through a Flock of Doves

**II: A Bullet through a Flock of Doves**

**(GPOV)**

"Morning." The voice that greets me when I awake, undead, sluggish, is beautiful, like a symphony, and I yearn for more of it. "How do you feel?"

Who? Who is this? Where am I? Oh, I remember. _Oh_. The texts from dad, running away, the...the gun, in the ominous night time. Frank. _I'm in Frank's bed_. Ah, wow.

Oh, wait, I'm supposed to return the greeting, answer the question. "Hey. I'm...okay, I guess. You?"

"I'm just shocked at how calm you are. Six hours ago –" it must be about eight AM " – you were held at gunpoint, and now...God. You're fine. It's incredible."

"I've had worse," I admit carefully, and wonder why I'm offloading my life story onto this stranger. "Just...never from someone I don't know before."

"Really? _Worse_?" Frank's voice goes all high pitched with surprise, and he kneels on the bed, leaning in toward my laying form, like an excited child ready to hear a bed time story.

"Yup. A lot worse."

"Will you tell me?" I don't want to talk about my life – I'm sure it will blow any chance of a friendship out the window – but I don't want to decline his request when I broached the subject in the first place anyway.

"Well...At school, I'm kinda bullied. They don't like me, 'cause of how I dress, and..." I leave out the part where _I'm gay_. "So, anyway, most of the time they just swear at me or whatever, but some guys do more than that. They stick notes to my locker, they hide things inside it, they hit me sometimes, and...once...There was this guy, Bert. And they beat us both up," because we were dating, "and Bert went to hospital in a coma...he's okay now, but they moved away...and I tried to protect him, because he was my" boy "friend, but they had a knife, and..." I trail of, and my hand flutters to my waist.

"And what?" Frank muses quietly after a couple of minutes of silence. Debating with myself silently, I then unzip my plain grey hoodie lift up the bottom of my Lostalone t-shirt to reveal the bottom of my abdomen, and the scar there. It looks like I had a particularly messy, unsafe, barbaric, seventeenth-century caesarean section in a public restroom with an unsterile breadknife. As a matter of fact, all that happen was they ambushed Bert and me, I tried to protect Bert, they knocked me out, kicked Bert's head in, then when I came around, they pulled a knife on me to stop me running away. But Bert needed help so I tried to escape to call for an ambulance anyway...which was where my tee was destroyed...as well as most of my stomach. Bert was in a coma for a fortnight, then he moved away. I was hospitalised for eight weeks and my parents didn't care. Mikey never left in the first ten days though, and after that he came every day after school – sometimes after dinner, too – and spent almost all of his weekends with me. My parents came in twice, to identify the casualty (my face was so swollen and bruised, they couldn't tell if I was the dude on my Driver's License or not) and to collect me.

"And they had a knife. I annoyed them and couldn't run far enough fast enough. Now I have this souvenir to remind me of what happened for the rest of my life." I'll never forget what happened; never forget I'm a faggot, not for one minute.

"Why?" Frank laments, seeming so forlorn. "Why would anyone do that to you? To anyone?" The intimacy of the second sentence makes my heart flutter, but the hasty generalisation silences that emotion. God, what's wrong with me? I've got a crush on Frank? No, no, I can't have. Great.

I've got a fucking crush on a fucking straight guy.

"They don't like me," I shrug, sighing and boring my eyes deep into the bed. "I don't know why. I mean, I do know why, there is a reason, at least, but it never seems like a good reason, if y'know what I mean. Why hate someone because of...That?"

Frank still thinks I'm talking about my appearance and taste in music, which does contribute a little to the bullying, but not as much as the whole homosexuality thing. Maybe they're scared, scared I'll like them. But (before Frank) I've never liked a straight guy, and I'd never make a move unless I was sure he liked me back. Unless I fell really hard for them. Maybe I'd try then, even if I didn't think it would work.

"Dicks," he mutters bitterly, and I can't help but laugh. He grins with me, and then invites, "Breakfast?" I nod happily – _happily_! – and he stands, leads me downstairs to the kitchen. My feet are hot on the cold tiles, and I walk quickly so I don't get frozen feet. Frank makes pancakes with soy milk and sits opposite me at the table.

"Sorry," he apologises, blinking hard and fast. "I can't have dairy, so..." I nod; it's fine.

"Are you vegan?" I ask him, then realise he's eating eggs. Dumb question. Still, he smiles faintly at me, a hint of that wicked grin dancing across his full lips.

"No. Vegetarian. But I'm lactose intolerant, and I have these...allergies. God, I sound like a nerd. But, yeah, it's kinda awkward. Everyone just thinks I'm really fussy, but..." He shifts his gaze to the table nervously and adds, "Sorry." I wonder why he's so haphazard.

"These are really good," I tell him – they are. I should have watched how he made them; they're delicious.

The flash of a grin blinds me, even if it is a little wonky from him acting so...insecure. What's up with him?

"So, how old are you?" he asks, and I think it's weird that we're sitting here eating pancakes when we know so little about each other. For all I know, he could be a serial killer, and the same applies for him.

"Eighteen," I reply, when I finish chewing. I take a sip of coffee – he's made it black and strong and like sludge, just how I have it. "You?"

He nods, "I'm seventeen. Do you go to the high school here? Belleville one?"

I frown. He's gonna come to school with me, right? Gonna hear the bullies, find out I'm gay. God, I'm screwed.

"Well, I'm enrolled there, but I don't go very often." It's the truth; I only generally stay in school for art or drama or music.

Frank grins at me, like he thinks this is amazingly badass. "Don't your parents get pissed off?" he asks wondrously. Frank must have the kind of parents who give a shit about his education, his future.

"Not really. So long as I'm not home when I'm not supposed to be, they don't care."

Something clouds his eyes, but he nods again anyway. "I'm just about to start there. Maybe you could show me round on one of the days you're there?" he teases, and I giggle – _giggle_, ugh! "I just moved from New York, something to do with my dad's work, I think. I hate school, 'cause I used to be bullied, too, like you are, I guess. A little different, but... Anyway, my mom thinks I'm gonna make a fresh start here, but I don't know about that. I guess I hope I can."

I nod understandingly and finish my breakfast. Chugging his coffee, Frank stands and clears our plates, dumping him in the sink. "Do you want me to take you home?" he asks, and I pause. Do I still have a home? Well, I guess I better go back there and check it out. Mikey will let me in, he'll be awake now.

I'm desperate to ask Frank about last night, but scared of how he'll react, so I keep my inquisitive mouth shut and just nod 'yes please'. He jogs back upstairs, and I follow him into his room again.

"Do you want to borrow some clothes?" he asks, and I nod gratefully. He opens the wardrobe doors for me, and heads to the bathroom, telling me to pick what I want. I grab a Falling in Reverse tee and a plain black sweater, a pair of black skinny jeans, as well as his skeleton gloves and my motorbike boots. His clothes smell of washing detergent and, indeed, Frank. I'm not entirely sure what Frank smells of, but it's gorgeous. I breathe into the clothes deeply, inhaling the scent so I can't forget it, before I let Frank back in. I borrow his toothbrush, eyeliner and straight irons, and then we're both ready to leave.

We don't talk a lot on the way back, apart from the basic stuff – he's Frank Anthony Iero, seventeen, birthday's Halloween, he has four tattoos already, wants to be a guitarist, was in a band back in New York, wants to start another one here, phobia of heights, broke his arm in middle school. That's pretty much all there is to tell me on the journey, and as we pull in, I gulp. But I see Mikey's figure through the kitchen window, so I figure I should be safe (ish) for now. I hope.

I thank Frank and climb out the car, shaking on my trek down the path. Mikey lets me in when I knock, though, and his anxious blue-green-gold-flecked eyes flash with relief when he sees me, as he engulfs me in a huge you-scared-me hug. I sink into it willingly, and smile a little. It's worth living here just to be with my brother. He's saved my life so many times already, I need him with me.

It strikes me that I never hear Frank pull away, but I'm distracted by Mikey's anxious blubbering about a guy and a gun and three unidentified corpses found near the 7/11 last night, plus he's made coffee. I tell Mikes the whole saga, and he sits there, gobsmacked, throughout.

"Well," he concludes, after I've finished. "When are you going to ask him out?"


	3. They Never Liked You Anyway

**III: I Think They Never Liked You Anyway**

**(GPOV)**

After Mikey, Mom is the first to come downstairs, not ten minutes after Mikey asks me the _big question_, and she looks a little shocked to see me, but says nothing. My mom, on her own, is absolutely fine. I love her, really. She's still the person who taught me to tie my shoelaces and ride my bike, who told me it would be okay when I thought a grazed knee would end the world, who pushed me on the swings at the park, and who teased me about my first girlfriend when I was eleven. She didn't even seem to mind that much when I came out, four years after Margaret Davis, the fifth-grader. But where my Dad gets involved, that's when she's a bitch. She loves him, y'see. That's all. Unfortunately, she seems to think this means she must agree with him on every point, including that I am a faggot, and don't deserve to live with them, or even live, some days. But on her own, she's pretty nice to me. I still love her, and I think she still loves me too.

Her nails are painted crimson to match her lips, and her eyebrows are neatly-shaped, thin black arches. She's wearing her wedding ring too, something she never does in the house anymore, for fear she'll lose it (my Dad can be a tyrant, and it's not always directed at me...though, 98% of the time, it is). She must be going out, but I wonder where. She speaks:

"Hello, Gerard. Your Dad told me you wouldn't be here."

I nod, staring into my empty coffee cup before I muster the courage to talk to her. I'm swallowing back insults about the man, in case he can hear me. "He threw me out. Or, more, he wouldn't let me in, and told me I couldn't live here anymore."

"How many times have you been thrown out now?" Her voice is entirely emotionless, diplomatic, and it's like talking to a robot in the sense that she won't develop an opinion until my father does, and then she'll copy his, not speak unless she's agreeing with him.

"Six. Seven, including last night." I don't even have to think, I know it by heart. This neither shocks nor hurts my mom; like I said: a robot. Can't think until she's programmed to do so, and even then, her thoughts aren't her own.

"Hasn't this taught you anything?" Her tone of voice is, again, emotionless, but I can't help but think there's a dagger hidden in it somewhere, just waiting to be used against me.

"It's taught me that my father thinks I should be homeless, possibly dead, because of my sexual orientation. It's taught me that I live in a society where too many people are homophobic and judgemental. It's taught me that nobody wants me, apart from my brother. It's taught me that my Dad doesn't love me."

"He loves you very much, actually. How could you say such a thing! How could you, Gerard? Now do you see why he doesn't want you here? You have no respect for anyone or anything, you're rude and argumentative. You're never happy unless you're the victim, are you? Did you ever stop to think that maybe we – your father and I, even Mikey – were the victims? We're the ones who have to live with you! For goodness' sake, we share DNA! You're _ours_! Can you not understand how devastating that must be for us?"

Oh. The robot got feisty.

This is the reason I'm depressed. It's genetic, but it's not usually this bad. No, the reason I throw up everything I eat, the reason my upper arms are _always_, no exceptions, covered up, the reason I hate myself, the reason I've written fifty plus suicide notes, the reason I _want to die_...this is it. This shit is it. And nobody understands, nobody cares. The only person who knows is Mikey, and he knows as well as I that he can't do anything about it. This is why I want to die. This is why my existence is worthless.

"Mom, why don't you love me?"

"Out."

"What?"

"Get. Out."

"Mom! Mom, mom, I thought you...Why have you changed your mind?"

Her eyes: fire. It scares me. My mother actually scares me. I have the height, weight and age advantage – not that I could ever bring myself to hurt her physically, even if she shot me first – but I'm still absolutely terrified.

"Nothing changed. I didn't change. I am me, I always will be. I'm the one who gave birth to you, and that sick thought haunts me every day. A _faggot_. A faggot! FAGGOT! But last night, I found something out. You went out! You were out, with other faggots, and you were...ugh! It's wrong. It's not right. It's not human. You're not human, not really."

"It was you on the phone? I assumed it was Dad..."

"Never assume anything, _son_." She spits the word at me like it's dirty, a taboo. Something to hide from her friends, the neighbours, people at church. She's never told anybody I'm gay. I think I'm a disappointment to her. After that outburst, I think I may be a little more than a disappointment.

"Mom..." Mikey begins; he's been frozen like an icy statue throughout the whole thing, but he speaks now, only to be silenced by a violent flick of my mother's hand.

"You're next, _Michael_." No one ever calls him Michael. "You're not as bad as your brother, but he's certainly corrupted you a little. _Bisexual_. As if anyone could be bisexual. It's one or the other: straight or not, normal or not, right or wrong. There is no middle ground."

Mikey's jaw drops, his glasses start to slide down his face – it would be funny, but it just isn't, not in this situation. My mom continues regardless. "Now, Gerard Way, get out of this house, out of my sight, out of my life. If either of us see you ever again, your father and I will not be responsible for what happens. Isn't that right, honey?"

My father strides into the kitchen, hair slicked back '50s style, with a tornado spiralling across his face. Desperate to look anywhere but at him, my eyes scan the floor, the cupboards, the...open...window, the view outside. Houses mirrors of ours, cars parked...a black car still on our drive. Why is that still there? Is it Frank? What is he doing?

But I don't have time to consider that, my father is speaking and if I don't pay maximum attention I'll know about it. "Out, now, Gerard. You'd better be grateful we're being this merciful, that we're letting you out. Your mother is right. If we see you again...well, that won't be our fault, will it?" She nods; I refuse to associate her with being my mother. "Out, then. Now. While you have the chance."

Is that a threat? Are they threatening to imprison me in my own home? Hurt me? Is it a death threat? Jeez, it's just so stupid. I just don't know anymore.

Shaking, I stand, and gesture for Mikey to do the same. He copies my action, but my fath...he shouts "Down!" and he obeys. I squeeze his shoulder reassuringly, telling him telepathically that they love him a little, they'll go easy on him. He's not a full-blown _faggot_, after all. I can't believe what mere words can reduce a person to: can't believe these people almost cost me my life so many hundreds of times.

"Bye, Mikes," I stutter, terrified, and he nods forlornly, eyes wide and deep and scared. I try to conjure up a smile for him, but all I manage is a ghostly grimace. Before anyone makes an attempt to kill me, I'm out the house, running.

The car on the drive, it _is_ Frank. I recognise the number plate. Why did he stay? I don't care; just throw myself into the passenger seat. I don't even have my belt on before he's off the drive, breaking the speed limit about four times over.

"What was _that_?" he exclaims disgustedly, shifting the gear stick and taking the opportunity to look at me. A speed camera flashes; he doesn't seem to care.

I swallow hard, don't speak. After a while, I reply, "I'm gay."

Frank nods slowly, understanding. I still can't breathe, his chest contorts irregularly with anger. I don't know if he's angry at me for being a faggot, angry at himself for looking after one, or angry at my parents for treating me like that. I'm scared of which one it is.

"I figured that. But...Is it like that all the time at your house?"

"It's not my house," I snap defensively, then look at my hands regretfully in apology. "I...My mom isn't usually like that. But something along those lines, yes. All the time."

Frank shakes his head remorsefully; I quiz nervously, "How much did you hear?"

This time, he looks at his hands on the steering wheel, and I fear the worst – I'm right to do so. "All of it. I mean, I didn't stay to listen. I just thought it was weird, how scared you seemed, and I stayed for a couple of minutes to make sure you were okay. And then your kitchen window was open, and my window was open, and I could hear you talking to your brother. I...I was curious about last night, but I didn't want to ask, so I thought I could find out this way. I'm sorry; I didn't really mean to eavesdrop. Then your mom came, and I think most of China heard what she had to say. So I stayed in case you needed an escape vehicle or something," half a grin at the way it sounds; like we're armed robbers. "And, you did, so, here I am."

"You don't hate me?" I wonder, astounded, gazing at Frank's amazing chocolate, nearly midnight, eyes with a furrowed brow. Why is he still helping me, now that he knows?

Frank _laughs_. Actually laughs, though it's humourless. It's more of a surprised, nervous high sound, and it confuses me. "Why would I hate you, Gee?" My name wrapped around his tongue distracts me for a minute.

"Because...y'know...because I'm...a faggot."

"Gerard," Frank says sternly, frowning now. "You are not...a _faggot_, okay? You're gay, I get that. It doesn't bother me." My mouth falls open, jaw slack, but he continues to speak. "You are not a bad person just 'cause you don't like girls. You are an amazing person. Very brave. _And_ you talk in your sleep...it's seriously cute," he smiles sympathetically. "So don't ever let stupid shits like them get to you. You gotta know who your friends are. You can't let anyone like that ever put you down, okay?"

I nod weakly, and he touches the inside of my elbow softly, just for half a second.

"It'll be okay," he promises, and – despite my rational mind – a huge chunk of me wants to believe him. "C'mon. I'll take you to my place. My Dad will be home later, he'll know what to do."

This scares me quite a lot, but Frank doesn't seem afraid of his parents, and two people who created this angel must be nice too, right? He smiles at me as we pull up, and he even opens my door for me when I stay frozen in the chair.

"It will be okay now. I promise."

I really fucking want to believe that.


	4. Words I Thought I'd Never Speak

**IV: Words I Thought I'd Never Speak**

**(FPOV)**

It takes a while to digest all I heard outside Gee's house. I can't believe how cruel his parents are. He's their son, for God's sake, whether he's gay or straight or bi or transsexual. And the way Gee spoke about himself... _because I'm a faggot..._his parents have made him hate himself. I still don't understand how you can talk to your own child like that, though. Neither of my parents would ever say anything like that to me, even if they didn't like that I'm bi. Which they don't mind. Mikey's bi...God, I'm speaking about him like I know him. But to say that it doesn't exist – the idiots! A part of me just wants to take Gerard's hand and tell him everything will be fine, no one will hate him or bully him anymore. But I can't make that promise, can I?

"I...Your house is so big; I didn't realise this morning." Gee snaps me out of my worried spiral of thoughts, striding into the living room and pirouetting, looking up at the ceiling. I guess it is pretty big; it looks like it's been transported straight from Georgian England on the outside, so there're four floors. I guess Dad earns a ton, I guess I'm lucky. It doesn't make me happy.

"I guess it is, kinda. Do you wanna get something to eat?" He shakes his head, looking anxious and puzzled and delighted all at the same time. "Coffee?" I offer instead, and he nods enthusiastically at that. I've found his penchant already. _Coffee_.

I pour Americano into two cups and we sit in my room and drink it, talking. At first it's just polite – we avoid sensitive subjects like sexuality and guns and his parents – but the topic of conversation soon turns to last night.

"Why were you out last night?" I ask Gerard, and he pauses, swallows hard before he replies. I feel bad for being so nosy, but I figure we need to talk about it sometime, and there's no time like the present.

"I...My Dad, I mean, my mom wouldn't let me in the house. I was on the way to a friend's, to see if they'd let me stay. Bob's. Ashley's, I mean. Bob is away. Anyway...I, why were you out?"

"Buying hot chocolate," I reply, like it's the most natural thing in the world to be buying cocoa at 1:30 AM. "Back in New York, most of the stores were 24 hour. I assumed they'd be the same here, but it was shut. Just as I was turning back, I heard a gunshot, so I hid. I saw everything, y'know. I nearly came out a ton of times, but I was scared," I stare at his hands, ashamed. "But when he...I wasn't going to let him kill you, no way."

"Maybe you should've," he says dismally. "Maybe it was fate, I was supposed to die."

Silence sinks over us, hanging like a looming storm cloud until I enquire, "Do you ever feel like you should be dead? Do you ever think you deserve nothing other than a cheap funeral and an urn abandoned at an undertaker's because no one wants you, alive or dead?"

Gerard's autumn eyes bore into my own, right deep past my irises into my skull, my brain, my soul. It's a thoroughly blackened soul, but there's not much I can do about that. Finally, he answers "Yes. All the time." Silence stalks us, creeps back into the room until it is slain by Gee asking, "Why? Do you?"

Afraid to say the words, I merely nod meekly, adding, "I thought I was alone. No one understands, y'see: I just can't explain the feeling. And there's no reason to feel that way. I mean, my parents are divorced, but it happened when I was young so it never really affected me. I have two stable families, I live with my Dad, and his girlfriend is really nice; my mom's boyfriend is cool with me, they don't care that...about...ah, we have money, I guess, and I'm not that bad at school, and my parents let me do pretty much what I want, but they still look out for me. I don't doubt in any way at all that both of them love me, I've never had a reason to. But other people, I mean, you...But I still feel like this. Suicidal. Depressed. And everyone would just think I'm an attention-seeking dick if I told them."

Gerard nods like he gets it. I hope he does, I hope he's not just another detached pretender. "Maybe it's genetic," he suggests. "Maybe your brain just ain't wired up right."

I stare at my feet and nod down at them, replacing Gerard's feet for my brown socks. I want to tell him, but I'm scared of what he'll think. I remember what Mikey said to Gee in the kitchen - _when are you going to ask him out?_ – and sigh when I realise it must have been a joke. Gerard never brought it up, so it can't mean anything. If he liked me, really liked me, he'd have mentioned it to me, insisted it was a joke, or been brave and told me how he feels – would have felt. But he never mentioned it, so it can't mean anything to him – he knows I heard. It was just a joke. I've got a crush on this guy...and he laughs at the idea of dating me. This is why I can't tell him I'm bi. I just _can't_. It'll ruin the friendship before it's even started.

"So," he says, butchering the thick, salty silence again. "How did you, y'know, scare him off?"

I laugh at that, laugh at the memory of myself being so reckless. I bet it would've looked stupid to anyone else, funny, even. Thinking back, I think it's funny, but in the heat of the gunpowder-scented moment I was deathly serious and terrified.

"I was hiding behind the bins, so I just ran forwards at him with a dustbin lid as a kinda pathetic shield/weapon thing. To be honest, I think it was the noise that scared him away more than the impending danger of a garbage can lid."

Gee giggles – it's so adorable, I want to hug him – and I join in. "Well, anyway, thank you. Your pathetic garbage can lid saved my life."

Something in me stops, my body shuts down. I didn't think of it like that before, it was simply instinctual. _I saved his life_. I _saved_ his _life_. He _owes_ his _life_ to _me_.

Wow.

We don't really talk about anything important after that – the conversations change from horror movies to music to gigs to aspirations to poetry to books to school. I make cheese toasties for lunch and we eat it squashed together on my bed, but Gee leaves right after to go to the bathroom. I only note it because it's the only time he goes, and because he takes so long. It sounds as though he's choking in there, and he rubs his throat when he comes back in the room, but simply shakes his head in a forget-it kind of way when I ask if he's alright. So I do forget it, and we talk about more: houses and grandparents and unicorns (don't ask) and families and bands. Gee says he wants to learn guitar, but has neither the time nor the money. I offer to teach him, in return for Italian lessons from him (he's half-Scottish and half-Italian, and drawls like New Jersey itself). This way, neither of us have to pay – and a bonus for me is that we get to spend extra time together. When I ask Gee how many languages he can speak, I end up shocked – four: Spanish, French, Italian and, obviously, English. But he looks just as awestruck when he asks about instruments: I play guitar, drums, a little bass and violin. So I guess it works both ways.

"Do you sing?" he asks, and I blush.

"Kinda. I was the vocalist in that band in New York, but I do more screamo than actual singing. I can sing if I need to, just not flawlessly. What about you? You sound like you can sing."

I go the deepest, darkest beetroot now. What a stupid thing to say. _Oh, Gee, your voice is amazing. It's velvety and soft and I love it. By the way, I also have a crush on you. _What a pathetic little fuck I am.

Gee blushes too though, so I feel a little less embarrassed about my sudden pink turn. He looks cute when he blushes, really cute. It's pretty shocking though, 'cause his skin is corpse porcelain, no colour at all in it, despite his Italian genes. "Well, kinda. Mikey thinks I'm pretty good, but-"

"Sing."

I shock myself with the sudden daring interruption, and Gerard looks taken aback too.

"Um, okay...what?"

I name the first song I can think of. "Jack The Ripper. D'you know it?"

He nods eagerly, then looks at the floor, embarrassed. I don't mean to embarrass him, but I'm so desperate to hear what I'm sure will be gorgeous.

Gee takes a deep breath, and then, "_Oh, you look so tired, mouth slack and wide, ill-housed and ill-advised, your face is as mean, as your life has been..._"

I'm right, of course. His voice...God, his voice! It's amazing! It's rough like sandpaper, just right for shouting or screaming without it going high-pitched or squeaky or cracking weakly. But at the same time, it's soft and velvety, like silk or water or something rich and smooth. I want to run my fingers through it.

I think my mouth has fallen open. Behind a shadowy fringe lie two autumn-amber eyes searching for praise, their hopes ready to be dashed or raised any moment.

"That was..." I gasp. "Amazing. Phenomenal. Brilliant. Perfect. Wow, just...wow. Why aren't you famous?"

"Because..." he grins, able to mock himself again; he's back in his comfort zone. "Because no one wants to hire a short-ish, average looking indie/punk/nerd of a half-Scottish band geek to sing for them, when there are taller, handsomer, healthier, happier, more reliable, more wholesome, older, better vocalists out there." He gives me a long, long gaze and I wonder what it's supposed to mean; but for the most part, I'm melting beneath his liquid gem stare. "That's why," he concludes, sticking a pink tongue out at me.

I'm silent, afraid of what he'll think of me if I insist he's beautiful, as is his voice, and not dishonest enough to agree with him, laugh at the joke that he makes of his existence. "Don't mention height," I say finally, as my own joke. Though it's not funny, and my tone is absent therefore humourless, he laughs, and I feel instantly better about myself.

"How tall are you, anyway?" he muses, looking me up and down. I feel both violated and ecstatic to have him look at me like this, but I've no idea of what he thinks; his expression gives nothing at all away.

I crack him a grin, and joke, "Four-nine." Gee shakes his head and demands to know the truth, so I tell him, "Five-four", and you're what? Five-eight-ish"?"

He nods. "Five-nine in my boots. But, yeah. God, you're so small."

"Is that bad?" I ask him worriedly, half flirting (though he could see it as a joke, if the very idea of us liking each other is a joke too) and half genuinely anxious. Gerard smiles reassuringly.

"No, not at all. It's...cute. I like it. You're...fun-sized. Fun-sized Frankie," he mocks, and we both laugh it off. "But, still, you're tiny! Does it come in handy for hide-and-seek and stuff?"

I choose not to point out that I haven't played hide-and-seek since I was seven and reply, "Kinda, yeah, but everyone seems to think I'm smaller than I really am, so they send me into places and I get stuck."

Something like humour or pity or curiosity washes over his pallid face, and he asks, "Where's the weirdest place you've ever gotten stuck, then?"

That's a seriously difficult question. There're all the usual places (if it's usual to get stuck inside furniture) like in the closet, the washing basket, washing _machine_ (it wasn't on, for your information), kitchen cupboard, behind the sofa. Eventually, I decide, "Inside a kiln. Man, that was a painful dare."

Gerard's jaw drops and he stays soundless for the few seconds it takes for me to hear my Dad pull up. I glance at my watch: it's five-fifteen. We've been talking like this for near enough seven hours. Isn't he bored yet?

"My Dad's home," I inform Gee, and he cringes.

"Hey," I console him gently. "It's okay. He's not...well, y'know. He won't mind you being here. In fact, he'll probably be over-the-moon about it; kept nagging me about making new friends and shit when we moved. So he'll be happy. And he won't ask questions, he isn't nosy like that. Your name, maybe, your age. That'll be it. I bet he'll let you stay, too, if you want to sleep here again. I mean, you could go to...Ashley's if you wanted, but..." I trail off, Gee nods gratefully.

"I'm sorry, I just can't get over this. I've never been used to having parents like that, who, like, actually care. My Dad would never have let me have anyone to sleep over, especially not another guy. But I guess it means more to my Dad than yours..." Not really, Gee. "So, I'm just...thanks. I'm really grateful, that's all."

I shake my head insistently. "Don't be grateful. I'm not even being that nice to you, really. You're probably bored out your skull. I'm just glad to have you here..." I didn't mean for it to sound like that – at least, not to the outside world. "I mean, I get kinda lonely sometimes, that's all."

Gerard smiles understandingly. "I know what you mean. And I'm not bored at all, actually. I like," he gestures to the area around him, my bed and walls and himself and me, "this, just talking. It's nice for a change."

This reassures me, and I hear my Dad shout a greeting. I wonder how it feels to be Gerard, to be without a real family like I have, but I can't imagine it at all. Even if my parents are divorced, it's like having two moms and two Dads, and I don't mind. All Gee has is Mikey, and I reckon they've been through some shit together. Absently, I wonder how Mikey is, how hard his parents were on him. Gerard doesn't seem too concerned, so I figure he knows Mikey is okay.

"Frank! I'm home! You eaten?"

"Hi, Dad! Not yet, but I've got a friend round." I shout back, and Gee looks kinda impressed with himself. Maybe it's the friend thing. From what I've heard, it doesn't sound like Gee has many friends either. Does he count me as one now?

After that, my father doesn't speak again, but I hear him come upstairs, change and then mess around in the kitchen. After a while, Gee looks at me, cocks his head sideways, and enquires "Do you smell burning?" I pause for a moment to sniff, but before I can answer, the smoke alarm blares in retaliation to Gerard. We laugh, and a couple minutes later, Dad shouts:

"Guys! Do you wanna order pizza?"

We eat it together in the living room downstairs, and Gee seems anxious and on-edge for a long time, but he eventually relaxes. I still can't imagine what it must be like to be afraid of your parents, terrified of doing anything wrong or of being inadequate. They've scared him into this self-hate, and fear of pretty much all other adults. And something inside me still aches to know they did that to their own _sons_.

Gerard orders spicy king prawn, and he wafts a hand in front of his open mouth when he realises how hot 'spicy' is. I offer him a slice of mine in the hope that his face won't burn off, but there are jalapeños on it, which doesn't improve the situation. I laugh as he runs into the kitchen and sticks his head under the tap, snorting when water gushes in his mouth so fast that half of it rebounds and splashes the window. Eventually, he pulls away, panting, and grabs a glass from the cupboard to drink from more conventionally, whilst he wipes the glass. Window dry, he pours tap water into the wine glass (he looked in the wrong cupboard) and takes another gulp.

"You okay?" I ask him, and it must make him jump because he gasps and drops the glass on the floor. Water runs in a minuscule ocean over the tiles, and I grab more kitchen paper and begin mopping it up. The glass smashes, too. I expect Gee to do the same as me, so when he doesn't, I tip my head up to glance at him.

"You okay?" I repeat softly, dumping the wet paper in the bin and grabbing the dustpan and brush to sweep up the glass.

Quivering chapped lips and teary amber eyes gaze down at me, molten with...terror?

"Please don't hit me. I'm sorry. _Please_."

My face hits the floor, honestly. I can't believe...Firstly, that he'd think I'd do anything like that, and secondly, that it's something he expects. He feels the need to beg me not to hurt him because of something so petty, and it makes me sick to the stomach. I can't begin to comprehend...Ugh! He must be _used_ to abuse. From the looks of things, it seems as though his father used to hit him, and over such pathetic things! The _bastard_. This man whom I've never met is someone I now want to slaughter. Brutally.

I'm about to speak, but I can't summon words from inside my churning brain, and Gee has started to cry. _It's just a glass_, I want to tell him. _Nobody's going to hurt you. Nobody will hurt you anymore._ But who am I to make that promise? I don't want to lie to him, fill him with false hope. So I just keep my mouth closed and tidy up the kitchen. Then I grab another glass from the cupboard, fill it with water and pass it to him. Shakily, he takes it, and gulps thirstily. Fresh water and salt water tears mix, and he looks at me forlornly when the glass is empty, like an abandoned puppy.

"I'm so sorry," he murmurs a little breathlessly, like his words are sharp like knives and they stick in his throat, piercing his skin.

I shake my head; he shouldn't have to apologise. It was an accident: I don't care, it's nothing. "Please," I ask desperately, "Don't apologise. It was an accident, so, please, don't feel bad. Please don't be afraid of me."

"Sorry," he chokes again, and pours more water from the tap. "It's just, I just..."

"It's okay," I try to soothe him; I think it works a little. Awkwardly, I reach out and touch his elbow, and he sighs into me. My Dad calls, asks what's taking so long, and we both jump, like we've been caught doing something we shouldn't be.

"It'll be okay now," I mutter under my breath as we walk back in to the living room. Gerard looks up, startled, and nods like he doesn't believe me but is scared to disagree. I never dreamed I'd be the one promising that to someone, though I was never on the receiving line of the message either. I was just so wrapped up in my own self-pity and depression; I never thought anyone else might feel the same. It's kinda soothing, to know I'm not the only one, but it makes me feel awful that there are other people out there who feel just as shit – if not worse – than I do, who have crap lives and crap families and crap futures. What makes it worse is that one of those people is Gerard. I want him to be happy, want him to feel safe and loved – by anyone. I want to be the one to save him.

I can see that he doesn't believe me though, so I extend the empty promise. Make it a dedication, a truth. It's a fact now, not something he has to rely on me for. It will be okay, he will be okay. I promise. It's just how it will be one day, I'll make sure of it, with every fibre of my being.

"I mean it. Forever."


	5. Been Holding On Forever

**V: Been Holding On Forever**

**(FPOV)**

(Two weeks later)

Since he's been officially thrown out, Gee's been staying at Ashley/Bob/Bob's mom's place, though my Dad thinks he's at home. His own home, I mean, where he's no longer welcome. I've met Mikey a couple of times (who is also living at Bob's, though this is more voluntary than because his parents don't want him) too, and he's really sweet. I've learned he has a book and music fetish and lives on Skittles and coffee, which is pretty much the same as Gerard – apart from the Skittles. Bob seems pretty cool too: he plays drums, though he's far better than me. Ray, their other friend, plays guitar, which is cool because he can thrash me on Guitar Hero and I can thrash him when it comes to singing, but we're pretty evenly matched where guitar is concerned. And his _hair_. Ray Toro is 90% hair; it's epic.

Catch-up over, I'm at Ray's house right now, along with Gerard, Bob and Mikey. Two weeks have passed since the gun incident, and Gerard already seems to be over it. I refuse to go out alone at night, and I get paranoid whenever I hear a loud bang, but other than that, I'm fine too.

"What shall we do?" ponders Ray, as he lays with his head on the floor, his back on the sofa and his legs up against the wall; his face is red from all the blood rushing to it. Mikey's sitting on the floor by Ray's head, his back arching around the arm of the couch, and Gee is above him, sitting on the arm. Bob is at the other side of the room with his long legs stretched out in front of him, and I'm flopped on a bean bag in front of the TV, my head resting on a cushion on the coffee table so I can see the other guys – like I'm about to be decapitated. It strikes me that there are two sofas and a bean bag, yet none of us are actually sitting normally in a proper chair.

"Watch a movie?" Bob suggests, but Ray pulls a face. We've been here for eight hours – since noon – and have already watched _The Atomic Brain_ (my God, you have to see it to believe it, it's ridiculous), _Psycho-Mania_ (disturbing), _Body Snatchers_ (not bad, actually) and _City of Lost Children_ (that one I did like, and I think Gee fell in love with it, judging by his face). Plus, we watched half of _LA Ink_ but it made my inkless skin itch, so we had to turn it off, purely for the sake of my sanity.

"Truth or dare," Gerard buts in, and I gulp. I hate this game, have ever since I played it two years ago with a bunch of dicks who despised me (the feeling was mutual) and I was dared to suck my own cock. Of course I didn't, but they told everyone I did. And naturally, everyone believed them.

But everyone else wants to play, so, not to be a killjoy, I reluctantly join their circle. Bob grabs and empty Mountain Dew bottle and spins it...it lands on me.

"Truth or dare?" Gee demands softly, his eyes lighting up kinda like a gentle murderer's; it scares me a little.

"Uh...truth."

Ray interrupts: "If you had to bang one of us, who would it be?" Something inside Gerard wilts, dies. I wonder why...

"What?" I demand, raising my eyebrows sceptically. I can't tell them the truth, not about that. Besides, what kind of question is that?

"Just answer," Mikey grins, wrinkling his nose to push his glasses back up his face, no hands on. I blink, keeping my eyes closed for longer than necessary, and answer, "Gerard." It seems stupid to tell them the truth when I'm _trying_ to keep it a secret, but I say it casually so it acts as a double bluff. Thankfully, it seems I'm light-hearted enough, I get away with it.

"I'm offended!" cries Ray playfully, clutching his heart with two hands dramatically and making his voice all squeaky, camp as he can sound. Everyone cracks up, and I join in, glad I'm off the hook. It's my turn to spin it, and it lands on Gee. I gulp.

"Dare," he answers the question confidently, before it's even been asked.

"Well, since Frank's so eager to, ah, take your relationship to the next level," Bob splutters, biting his tongue so he doesn't laugh, "How about you give him a nice kiss? Y'know, just tongues. Just a little bit of-"

While Ray's still talking, Gee's crawling forwards through the circle on all-fours toward me. In his ripped vest top and collar, the way he shakes his ass to make it look like some weird bondage. Not what I was expecting, but it sure makes everyone laugh. From the corner of my eye, I see something odd glint in Mikey's face, like something extremely significant – bad or good – is about to happen, and he's the only one who knows it. But it's probably just me seeing things.

"C'mere," he sandwiches the words together and waggles his eyebrows playfully, just a joke, before his face is suddenly...on mine. He seems to exude confidence, though he's usually so reserved, yet I'm sure I feel his face go hot like a blush. Maybe I'm the one blushing, he seems to at ease to be shy or uncomfortable.

My God, his chapped lips on my soft ones, his (presumably) cool face on my hot one, his icy tongue on my lip...it's just a joke, just a dare, but, wow. _Wow_. Ahem.

"Do that a lot?" I ask breathlessly when he's finally done, shuffling back over to his spot on the worn rug.

He takes a handful of Doritos from the bowl on the coffee table, munches one, picture of calm and ease and blasé. How does he do it?

"Not really."

I can't focus for the rest of the game; I'm hot and untidy under the fractious gaze. His eyes never leave me, and I like it that way. I'm so scared of him finding out how I feel, but even more terrified he'll never know. _I should tell him_, I think. _Tell him I like him. Tell him I'm bi._

I'd never have the courage to do that.

When we finish, Gee turns on the TV, and we find some movie channel. _Amelie_ is on, then _Mad Max_. I think I fall asleep somewhere during the second one, because I don't remember anything except from a murder and an abduction of some pretty girl he doesn't want to kill. I lay on the couch when I'm tired, my head on Gerard's shoulder, and when I wake up at 5 AM stiff and achy, he's right beside me, our knees touching. I feel electricity spark at every point we connect: knees, elbows, wrists, cheeks. A strand of his fringe washes over my face, and I breathe in the tart lemon of his hair and the soft scent of whatever else it is he smells of. Part of his vest has worked up while he sleeps, and I see his stomach exposed.

It's shocking. There's muscle and bone. And I can see the muscle and bone: his skin is stretched tight over it like a translucent nylon skin-tight tee. I swallow. Hard. Maybe he's ill. Maybe it's antidepressants, a side effect. They made me fat and gave me headaches when I used them, so maybe there're ones that mess with your weight in different ways. I don't know.

He can't have an eating disorder. It's not like he doesn't eat often, or a lot. Hell, he ate nearly all of the ice cream, and half the nachos. He can't be anorexic, it's not possible. It just isn't.

In the morning, I wake up to a sofa occupied only by myself. Gerard must have woken up after I fell asleep again and moved; he's on top of a sleeping bag, underneath a duvet, on the floor now. I miss his warmth and his smell and his life, his humanity. All I can see are his anxious, pinched white face, two hands grasping the duvet painfully hard and his sock-covered toes. No extra flesh on show. No eating disorder. Maybe it was just a dream, a delusion, a trick of the eye. He can't be _that_ ill.

"No, no! I'm sorry! I'm sorry, I, please, I'm...No! Please!" he shouts, though his voice is weak and pleading, sweet and hoarse, the sound only slightly muffled by the pillow it looks as if he's trying to eat.

"No, no!" he cries again. "No!" Seconds fly past, and I'm on the floor next to him, shaking his calf to wake him up. One hand on his collarbone and one on his leg, I wake him and touch his face when he struggles to blink two vulnerable autumn eyes open; he's cool and clammy, in a cold sweat. This confirms the obvious: he's having a nightmare. But he's awake now. I look around the room, it doesn't seem to have disturbed anyone. Ten past nine, my watch reads. They'll be waking up soon (and probably staying in bed, if they have any sense).

"Gee," I murmur, when he looks about frantically. "It's okay, you had a nightmare, that's all. You're okay."

"Mikey?" he asks, voice rushed and cracked like sun-baked honey, or a burned liquid. I understand what he means immediately, and nod reassuringly, glancing over to check. His brother is fine; I wonder if his dream incorporated his parents in it anywhere if he's concerned about his brother's wellbeing. I hope he isn't still afraid of them, but sadly, I think it's likely he is.

"Coffee?" I offer, and he nods gratefully as he sits up, orienting himself. While he looks around drowsily, I dance like I'm walking across hot coals to keep my feet off the cold tiles of the kitchen floor and pour two mugs of incredibly hot, incredibly black, incredibly thick, incredibly bitter, incredibly strong coffee. We all take it the same way, and so I pour out a third cup when I hear Bob's hushed voice whirring around the room like hollow wind with Gee's feathery murmuring.

"Morning," Bob greets me with a nod, which also acts as a thank you for the drink. I kick the bean bag over to where Gee and Bob are sitting and sip molten caffeine as I watch, rather than participate in, their conversation. It's something about Star Wars, some friendly argument. Apart from when Bob mentions Darth Vader – _then_ things get serious. I wait until they're both burned out, exhausted candles, before I ask what we're doing today.

Yesterday, before coming to Ray's, we went shopping, having spent the two previous nights at Bob's house watching cult movies from the 70s and eating Froot Loops. Ray's parents are getting back from wherever they went today – I think it was DC, but it could just as easily have been Washington State; I don't know, wasn't listening – so we can't sleep here again. I guess it'll be my place, which sounds absolutely fine, but I hope my Dad doesn't mind – otherwise we'll be staying in the attic.

Gee says we're gonna go to Glo World – which apparently is some funfair that comes every quarter on rotation with a circus – _Glo World, circus, Glo World, circus_, he says on the way there. He says that about four times before Mikey tells him to shut up. I don't agree with the whole keeping-animals-in-captivity-for-entertainment thing, so I'm glad it's the fair 'cause I'd feel awkward going on some one-man protest and standing alone outside while they all watched inside.

I get dressed while Gee showers, and when Ray wakes up, he kicks Mikey awake so he doesn't cause 'bathroom congestion' getting ready. I straighten Gee's hair for him since he never has the patience to do it all himself, and end up chasing Ray around with the straight irons, but he won't let me near his fro. However, he does let me apply eyeliner on him, and he borrows my Dockers in return for his Misfits pumps. I think I do pretty well out of the deal, especially because Gerard lends me his spare sweater (yes, he has a spare sweater – though I suppose it's covered in skulls so it's not as adorably dorky as it sounds) so I don't catch cold (how cute can this even _get_?) which smells exactly like him.

"Ready?" Ray asks, and everyone nods. When we're all suitably coffee and bagel-filled, we walk (I'm the only one with a car, and I didn't bring it, like an imbecile) to this Glo World place, and pay fifteen dollars each to get in. But the rides are free after, so I guess it's kinda worth it. _Kinda_.

We go on every fucking ride in the place; some of them twice. And I feel sick. I know what will make it better – donuts! Mikey actually does puke, right behind a bush, and it's his idea to get the food. I'll never understand the logic behind that, but I honestly feel better after eating, so I don't know. Like always, Gerard goes the bathroom as soon as he's finished, and I follow him this time, because the minute I've finished eating I get a sugar rush and need a drink; the vending machines are next to the toilets.

Fanta in hand, I follow Gee into the bathroom to sort my hair; I get the feeling it's frizzy. It actually doesn't look so out-of-control, but it's soaked from the log flume. The only occupied stall is the one with Gerard in it, and I don't think he knows I'm here.

There's a strange noise, and I have to cock my head to hear it. It sounds like...retching, or something. Like someone's being violently ill, and like it hurts. There's a small, quiet moan, and more of someone being sick.

But...there're only me and Gee in here. So, the person puking must be Gerard. But what...he never said he felt ill, and he looked fine – about as flushed as he ever gets and not drawn or cold.

Then something clicks in my head. The skin stretched so tightly over his abdomen. The bathroom visits after every single thing he eats. The way he rubs his throat painfully whenever he gets back, the mint gum he constantly chews – so no one can tell he's just vomited.

I was right before. He's not anorexic, he can't be. But I forgot that isn't the only eating disorder, like a dork. Eating disorders are for cheerleaders, right? And insecure teenage girls.

I shouldn't be so naive, so narrow-minded. They aren't just for insecure cheerleaders who want to be skinny. Everyone, anyone, could have an eating disorder. _Oh my God._

I should have known, should have worked it out earlier. Here I am, desperate to be the one to save him, cure him, make him happy, and I can't even see the problem squirming right under my nose.

I bang on the stall with my fist. "Gerard?" I enquire gently, not wanting to scare him. "Gee? Open the door."

No more vomiting noises. Two footsteps as he stands. Toilet paper being ripped from the roll – cleaning up? Wiping his mouth, hands, what? A flush, a hard swallow. Cough. He opens the door timidly, just a crack so I can only see half of his face, nothing else.

"Gerard?" I repeat, just as softly. "Are you..."

Tears. Before I can recognise he's crying, I stare at the salty water trickling limply down his face – I don't think he knows he's crying either. "Hey," I murmur, trying to comfort him. "Hey, hey. Don't cry. It's alright, it'll be alright."

"Nobody knows," he whispers into my hair finally, clutching my neck harder. His fingers dig into my flesh painfully, but I don't protest. He's still stood in the stall, so I take a tiny step back, towing him with me.

"Shh, shh, don't worry," I soothe when another sob escapes his mouth. He chokes back cries, but doesn't stop. "Shh..."

After a while, he stops shaking, and only tears pour, slower now, down his snowy cheeks. "You need help," I conclude, stepping back, my hands firmly planted on his shoulders. It makes me want to cry, to see him like this, but I can't; I don't want to make this worse.

He nods; old news. "I know. I just...I can't face telling anyone. Can't talk about it; it hurts too much."

"Mmm," I say in agreement, trying to placate him, while I think. "I understand, I guess. You don't want...You don't want to admit you're not okay, you don't want to seem weak," I'm speaking from experience now. "But, please, Gerard. Please get help."

Another choked-back sob. "I...I will, I swear, it's just..." I don't speak, just let him gather himself, pretending I can't see his steamy tears. "I just want to forget about it, make it go away. I don't want help, but I need it. I'm scared to get it." Another pause. "Please don't tell Mikey."

I chew on my lip, but promise him I'll keep it secret, on the condition he sees someone soon. "I'm scared," he confesses, staring at his boots as he says it – I understand this tactic, it doesn't count if you can't see their response.

"I know, Gee, I know." I glance at my watch: ten past four, we've been here twenty minutes. "C'mon," I say, trying to sound light; I think it works, I fool myself. "Get tidied up and we'll go outside. If you, y'know..." I take a deep, brave breath. "Can we talk later? I think we need to talk. But, c'mon, let's go. It will be okay now. I promise."

I wonder if he's sick of me saying that by now, or if he's starting to believe me. For once, his eyes don't look as dubious, and he squeezes my hand for courage as we exit the bathroom together. "I hope so," he mutters in reply, and smiles falsely – though it's a pretty good act – at Mikey when he spots us. I wonder how long he's been keeping this facade up, and for how much longer it will continue.

I want it to end right now.


	6. I Thought I Heard You Say I Like You

**VI: I Thought I Heard You Say "I Like You"**

**(GPOV)**

**One week later**

I call Bob first thing in the morning, haven woken up in Ray's bedroom. I know it's not the sleepover still, that the frightful exposure at the fair wasn't a nightmare, because we slept in Ray's front room, and I'm the only one here. Even Ray isn't anywhere to be seen, so I stand, wander down to the kitchen where I find Ray cooking bacon, and call Bob.

"Yellop?" he answers, some kind of combination of 'hello', 'nope' and 'yellow' by the sounds of it. I shake my head and ask,

"You busy?"

He answers immediately, "Actually, yes. I have a date. But not until seven tonight, so I'm free all day, I guess. Why? You wanna come over?"

"I was wondering if I could come hide at yours for a while. Is it Saturday? Ray's calendar says it's Saturday." If it's Saturday, today is the day I promised Frank I'd go see the shrink. It's also the day of our first un-date. It's like a date, I guess, but he doesn't like me, or even know I like him, so it's really more of a day out. Whatever it is, I think it's happening today.

"Yeah," Bob replies uncertainly. I think he checks his watch or calendar or something, because he adds, "Yup, Saturday 12th. Who are you hiding from?"

"Myself."

A pause. "Okay. That's cool. See you in a half hour at Hot Topic? I need new jeans, what time are you going out?"

"We're meeting at twelve thirty," Frank and I. "Hot Topic sounds good. See ya."

"Bye!"

Just today, just for Frank, just for the sake of what he thinks I'm doing this morning, I try my best to not throw up the cereal. But...it's fat. It's making me fatter, and it's just...I can't! Everywhere I look, I see fat – floating numbers taunting me – the salt and fat content, the calories...it's just...FAT. F, A, T. Everywhere. And it doesn't matter how far I go, how much I starve, how hard I try, it's never gonna change. I'm never gonna change. Some people are just fat, because of their greed and...uh! I'm one of them.

That's the first time I've ever tried to explain how it feels to anyone. Even myself.

Ray goes to meet Mikey (who has moved back into my...I mean, my parents'...house, so is my insider at the moment, with all the gossip) and I catch the bus into town, where Bob is dawdling outside Hot Topic.

"Hey," he grins, flashing his wallet at me when I reach him. "Guess whose parents gave him one hundred dollars because they hate my 'unfit for wear' jeans? Oh yeah..." I glance down at his jeans and see they're held together in at least two places by safety pins that aren't for decoration, and even tape at the top. "C'mon," he says, "I feel like a major trip is in order."

There's still thirty dollars left over after he buys three pairs of skinny jeans – one black, one blue, one ripped – and a Taking Back Sunday t-shirt, so he offers to take me in Starbucks. Once again, even after drinking like six hundred calories in the form of a caramel Frappuccino and cream, I don't make a break for the bathroom. I miss my throat burning from the shock of acid, shaken stomach and sore fingers from shoving them down my throat, but I almost take comfort in knowing the ghosts of guilt passed will be paying me a visit later. I still have forty minutes before I'm meeting Frank when I leave Bob to literally fondle his new purchases, so I kill time in the comic book store. I feel like a total geek, but I don't care, because I probably _am_ a total geek. Besides, it takes my mind off things. Three retards from my Spanish class walk past me when I trip out the store, empty handed, and they shout after me.

"Alright, faggot? How are we today? All emo and queer, huh?" _Stupid dicks,_ I chant to myself. _It doesn't matter, none of this matters. They're nothing, don't worry. Forget it, forget it._ I can't forget it. And now I hate myself again, and my only way of dealing with that is throwing up. But I can't, there's nowhere to puke. Besides, I promised myself I wouldn't, for Frank. I want to, though!

_Well, what's that matter?_ I ask myself sceptically. _He doesn't care, not really. He just feels sorry for you. He's not even gay, you pathetic faggot. He'll hate you when he finds out you like him._

I start to sprint, like I can escape the demons of my mind by outrunning them. But I'll never escape them until I'm dead, and I'll only ever die when they push me to it. It'll be like a victory to them, even though they'll be wiped out too. Like suicide bombers. There are suicide bombers living in my head, just to top everything of perfectly.

I'm out of breath when I get to Frank's house, twenty minutes early. "Oh, hey," he smiles as I gasp on his doorstep. "You're early, aren't you? Come in."

"Appointment finished early," I lie easily, not liking how the words trip off my tongue like the truth. He nods, believing me, which makes it even worse, but there is no way I'm telling him I never made an appointment, and no way I'm going. I can't do that to him or to me.

"Sit down, then. I'll just be two minutes."

He re-emerges in the same outfit, but with the addition of a belt, gloves and eyeliner. "Ready?"

I nod happily, glad to be on our way, the subject of shrinks hopefully forgotten now.

**(FPOV)**

I want to ask Gee what the psychiatrist said to him, but I'm afraid he won't want to talk about it, so I keep quiet. I don't want him to think I'm nagging him.

"Where are we going?" he wonders, and I tell him. It feels – to me – like this is a date, but of course it isn't, it never could be. If he liked me, he'd have hinted at it, or asked me if I was gay/bi too. I mean, yeah, he kissed me, hard, but it was for a dare, like a huge joke. If he liked me, he'd be nervous around me, or bolder and ask me out. He's neither of these things, so the feeling isn't mutual. I'll move on, I promise myself I will. I just don't know how long I'll desire Gee for before I get over him, and wrapped up in all this angst, I can't imagine ever _not_ feeling this way.

It's not far, so we walk, and Gee gasps when we arrive, his jaw literally dropping three feet. "Wow..." he stretches out the word, running a hand through his long ebony hair. Doesn't he know what that does to me? Is he doing it just to taunt me?

"You like it?" I ask teasingly, working to keep it light-hearted, yet again. I love this place, I only discovered it a couple of weeks ago, and it's really out of the way – it looks as though Gerard, who's lived here all his life, has never seen the place before.

"It's amazing," he breathes, awestruck, spinning around like a child in a sweet shop. "But...how did you know it was here? I've never seen it before."

"I was just walking one time, and I got kinda lost. Then I ended up here." I shrug, looking around the place myself. It's a huge clearing in the sparse but lush forest, and the trees are place far apart, forming a circle on the ground but making a shadowy fresh canopy above our heads. The grass beneath our boots is spongy like moss and dry and hot as stone, like it's absorbed and retained all heat that ever beat down on NJ.

Gee finishes pirouetting, turns to grin insanely at me, looks puzzled for half a millisecond. The expression passes, and he strides confidently over to the tallest tree. "Race you to the top," he challenges greedily – his autumn eyes look hungry, greedy.

"But I can't..." Too late. He's already hooked like a koala around the lowest branch, twisting and turning and clambering so he's balancing on top of the bough, wobbling only slightly in his motorbike boots. "Fine," I roll my eyes, every inch the teenager, and follow him up. He's faster than me, but I'm nimble, and despite his advantage I beat him to the top by about two seconds.

"I win!" I declare triumphantly, and he sticks his tongue out at me, so I flip him off casually. "What now?" I ask breathlessly, my hands entwined with each other, looped around the top branch, my feet balanced on the one beneath it. I lean down toward Gee, and he stretches up to me.

His eyes, I realise for the first real time, are phenomenal, beautiful, gorgeous, ravishing, dashing, amazing. They really are autumn eyes: molten gold and enchanting emerald and subtle sapphire flecks and glistening opal and shiny amber and every jewel under the sun – it's there. _I want to kiss him._

My eyes wander daringly to his flawless porcelain skin, three pink blemishes on his chin, two bushy eyebrows like coal caterpillars, thick, black eyelashes framing his liquid eyes, a small, rounded, perfect nose, plush faintly pink chapped lips, soft ebony hair on a softer ivory face, concealing one soul-melting eye, and those seriously weird – but, yet again, beautiful – teeth.

I ache, yearn, beg, plead, desire, want, need to kiss him. It's absolute, this longing, but I cannot let myself, cannot give into such lethal temptation. So I just stand in the tree as leaves fall across our near-touching bodies, and breathe onto him, inhale his thick, delicious aroma. I want you.

I don't care how messed-up he is, how ill he is, how depressed he is, how skinny he is, how much trouble he is, how lonely he is, how empty he is, how reluctant he is, how disinterested he is, how apathetic he is. I don't care, I just don't care. I don't care about anything anymore...all those things I thought mattered, they're irrelevant, useless, pointless. I don't need them, and they don't need me to be concerned about them. All I need is Gerard, and all he needs is...what? It's certainly not me, he doesn't need me to complicate his cacophony of a life, surely.

But I don't care; I'm selfish enough to not care. I want what's best for him, of course, and I want him to be happy. But more than that, _I want_what _I want_, what I need. And what – who – I want, who I need, is Gerard. _Why_ can't I have him? Why? It's not fair!

_I want you. Why can't I have you?_


	7. So Sick and Tired

**VII: So Sick and Tired of All the Needless Beating**

**(GPOV)**

I don't know how long we stay in the clearing, but it's dark when we reach Frank's house. _I want to kiss you_, I think, but I banish the thought. I can't think like that, it's masochistic to dwell on my yearning for something that will never, can never, happen. So I forbid myself to think of that, think of Frank like that, and gaze at his face as subtly as I can, so he doesn't notice. The heavy heat of his eyes on my lank body makes me dizzy, and I'm genuinely surprised when I don't pass out. Maybe I can't pass out anymore; maybe my body isn't capable of that function. Perhaps I'm completely numb, and I'm clinging to my aching for Frank because it's the only emotion I still have left.

His Dad is in when we arrive back at his house, and his Dad's girlfriend. Lindsey, she's called, and she's insanely pretty, with _the most awesome_ sleeve I have ever seen, and she lurks beneath constant cover of crimson lipstick. "Hey," she smiles from underneath his Dad's arm when we walk in.

I smile back at her, "Hi!" I sound too exuberant – my day with Frank has left me too happy, or, at least, happier than normal. It's wondrous no one has declared me a fraud: exclaimed that this grinning person cannot possibly be Gerard Way.

"Do you want a lift home?" his Dad offers, standing to face Frank and I. "I was just about to drop Lindsey off, so..."

"I'm actually staying with Bob at the moment, and you don't need to go out of your way. I don't mind, I can walk or get the bus or whatever."

Frank offers to take me, but his father dismisses us both with a casual wave of his hand. "Nonsense, there's no point us all going out separately. I'll take Lindsey home then drop you off at Bob's, Gerard, okay?" I don't want to argue – arguments, especially with fathers, scare me –so I nod and thank him.

"Can I come, Dad?" asks Frank excitedly, like a high puppy. He's speaking as though it would be an honour to be invited into the car.

"Sure, whatever," he shrugs, and tells Lindsey, "Are you coming? Get your coat, sweetie. I'll just be two minutes."

She's actually only sitting on her SNIPER jacket, so remains on the sofa and asks, "What have you two been up to today, then?" I tell her we went out – though not like that, unfortunately, I think to myself – and Frank explains where. She actually looks interested in what we're saying, which is pretty new to me.

Frank gushes, "Be right back, I just need to do something," leaving me and Lindsey alone together in the living room. She budges up and nods at the space next to her, so I go and sit down by her side obediently. I like Lindsey; I wish she was my mom. I wonder if Frank feels the same, or if he's okay with his mother.

"Do you like him?" she whispers knowingly, voice low and eyes soft but intense, looking right at me. I squirm under her gaze.

"Is it that obvious?" I ask uncomfortably, afraid now. What if it is clear to see, what if Frank knows? God, I'm such an idiot.

She shakes her head reassuringly. "No, no, of course not. He hasn't got a clue, I can, like, tell. But there's something in the way you, like, look at him..."

I nod reluctantly. "Yeah, I like him. Don't tell Frank, though, Please don't tell him."

Lindsey nods again, promising me. "Of course not; I wouldn't tell anyone. Don't worry about it, I was just curious."

As if on cue, like an impeccably-timed sit com, Frank walks into the room in his black cardigan. It's still difficult for me to comprehend how someone with four tattoos before he's eighteen, multiple facial piercings and an eyeliner and kohl pencil collection like his can wear a _cardigan_, but I guess there's a lot about him I don't understand. Besides, it suits him – he looks good in a cardigan. And I can't believe I just said that.

"My coat's in your room," I remember suddenly – I've been without it for the three days since I was last here. He nods, like I've just reminded him too, and says, "I put it out the way on my chair, I think," in a stony voice. I wonder what's up: he's been happy all day; but I don't mention anything aloud.

His room is like a bombsite, like the middle of a blitz, a warzone, so it's practically impossible to find anything, but I somehow locate my leather jacket amongst his stacks of tattoo designs and CDs and clothes and God knows what else.

On my way downstairs, I hear shouting, so I pause in case they stop when they hear me. I am, essentially, extremely nosy, but I'm insecure enough to believe that every hushed conversation must be criticizing me in some way, shape or form.

I hear my name, stop dead – no breathing, maybe even no heartbeat. Frank's voice, and Lindsey's. My first thought is that she's betraying me already, but I soon hear that it isn't the case.

"No! No, you moron! He's nothing but a liar, he's lying, he's lying. And I hate him. _I hate Gerard Way._"

"I don't think he's a liar. Nor do I see what give you reasonable grounds to hate him at all. He seems pretty nice, actually."

"You don't know anything, Lindsey. You don't know anything about any of this, so just shut the fuck up, okay? Shut it! You don't understand, you can't understand..." I hear Frank crying. For once, he's the vulnerable one, I'm the comforter. But I can't comfort him: I'm not down there with him. Besides, he _hates_ me.

She must have told him, I realise. He's found out, and now he hates me, like everything else. She told him that I fell for him – the straight guy. Soon will come the insults, then the hatred, then the physical bullying, just like everyone else. He's switched teams: he's against me too now. Nobody ever stays on my side for long. Who'd choose to be on the losing team? Who'd choose to be a loser?

It's frosty in the car, to say the least. I feel Frank glaring hatefully between me – next to him – and Lindsey – in the passenger seat. I pretend to be texting, though I don't have anyone to text, until a real message comes from Mikey.

**M: Plz come home now I need u**

**G: What's up?**

No reply. This scares me a little – Mikey has moved back in with mom and Dad, and what if they've turned? God, he might be in real danger. Worse, it might be one of my parents texting from his phone again in another attempt to trick me. It might be a warning from the executioners themselves, maybe they're handing me a slim chance to get there and save my brother, be a part of their game.

Well, I'm playing tonight. There's nothing left to lose now.

"Mr Iero?" I ask, after he's dropped Lindsey off at her house. "Do you think you could take me to my own house instead? I need to do a couple of things."

Frank gapes at me but doesn't speak a word, and I pretend that everything is completely normal and returning to my parents' home isn't a death wish. "Thanks," I say light-heartedly when we pull up on the ominous drive way; Frank doesn't speak to me, and I don't speak to him. "Bye!" I call, blasé as I can manage, as my voice begins to waver uncertainly. I'm scared sick to my stomach.

When I get inside, the first thing I do is take my shoes off by the door, throwing them over the rack, just out of routine. Mikey appears while I'm doing this, and I'm kinda shocked at how he just...emerges from absolutely nowhere. Everything seems so peaceful and still, casual somehow: the calm before the storm. I'm still crouched by the shoe rack, so I smile up at him, but he can't seem to repay the gesture: despite a valiant attempt, it doesn't reach half way up his face, never mind sparkle in his gold-flecked eyes. Then I stand, look at him properly. His face is bruised, lip and nose bleeding. There's a deeper cut in his temple too, only just stopping gushing blood. His eyelashes are matted with blood and clumped together with uncried tears; his knees are trembling. A small moan escapes him when I touch his face gently, my thumb stroking his cheek whilst simultaneously but subtly wiping away a hot trail of drying blood.

Who did this to you? I want to ask, but I know there's no point. I know who did anyway: it's quite obvious, and there's nothing I can do about it now. Still, I want to smash their skulls. Dying counts as a way out, doesn't it? Maybe I should blow the house up. Get Mikey out, then the three of us can die together, in some sort of rare and sick union.

"You'll be okay," I whisper softly, hoping it's true. I pull my hand away from his face, and contemplate dragging Mikes out the door with me, but I remember a) I have nowhere to go and b) he doesn't look in a fit state to be dragged anywhere, other than bed or the hospital. Neither are accessible right now, though. Mikey only nods at me, disbelieving, like he's already condemned himself. His pessimism will not be accurate. He _will_ be okay – if it kills me.

But then, just to complicate this pathetic situation even further, my father appears. He reeks of booze, his face is dangerously red, like a warning sign, and his eyes are burning black, I swear. In his hand is a half-full (see, I'm being optimistic) beer bottle, and he shouts, "I warned you!" before throwing it at me. The glass smashes noisily on the wall I'm backed up against, about an eighth of an eighth away from my head.

"Dad, just let me get Mi-" He silences me with a growl, and the molten fury flying over his face like a tornado is terrifying. "You'll be okay," I whisper under my breath again to my brother. I hope he hears: I hope it's true.

"I told you to stay out of here!" he cries, and lunges toward me. I dodge out of the way in time to see him hit the wall and not me, but he comes again, so I throw myself onto the hallway floor, hitting my head on the Goddamn shoe rack. It stings, burns, but I'm sure the pain will pass in a minute. I can't feel any blood, at least.

"It's your own fault," he snarls, face contorting like a gargoyle, and then comes at me again. I dodge once, twice, but he hits me the third time, his stony body crushing mine against the wall I'm slumped against. I shout at Mikey to go, but I'm drowned out by someone kicking me. My stomach first, then working its way up past my neck and shoulders to my face: there's no blood until he kicks my face, and I lift my hands to cover my mouth. Amongst all the blood and bruises, the last thing I need on top of this is broken teeth.

Then he reaches my forehead, and all hell breaks loose. One, two, three, four, five, six...I lose count. It hurts, it hurts so much. I want to scream, but I'm scared what will happen to my teeth if I open my mouth. Mikey does this for me; I'd forgotten he was there.

"Dad!" he cries. "Stop!" A pause. "For fuck's sake, stop before you kill him! You'll kill him!" This might be working: either he's slowing down because he's concerned, or slowing down to start something else. "Dad!" he begs again, and not a minute later, he's backed away from me.

"Go. If you come back, I swear, I'll rip out your throats." He glances at Mikey then. "The both of you! I mean it. Go, now. _Go_!"

"C'mon, Mikey!" I shout, and he seems paralysed, but when I pull hard on his elbow, he sprints out behind me. We fly all the way to the end of the block before we stop to pant, exhausted and terrified and bloody. "It hurts," I realise, shocked, running my cool, shaking hands all over my beaten face, trying to soothe. The stinging sensation is horrendous.

"You should go to the hospital," he remarks blankly, like he's numb, in shock.

I repay the compliment, but he only shakes his head, so I ask instead: "Did you text me earlier?" to which the reply is the same as the one to the previous question: _no_. "Mom," I sigh simply, and collapse down onto the floor. There is no reason for it to hurt so much.

"What are we going to do now?" Mikey finally asks, and I almost break down, because _I don't know_. It's Bob's or Ray's or Frank's house. Maybe Mikey's friend Stella, but that's a long shot seeing as she hates me and has a phobia of blood. Bob is on his date (Ashley's on one too: and dear God I hope they're two different dates), and Ray is at Warped, damn him. So that only leaves Frank.

I don't like the idea of that. We fell out. It hurts. I can't face being rejected by him, and it's not fair on anyone to demand that he picks up my bloodstained brother and me from the roadside. We've done nothing to deserve that – but I've done stuff to not deserve it.

So I cry. I just break down and cry, because I'm weak and pathetic and injured and alone and it hurts to know there's nobody there. My own brother is standing right next to me squeezing my shoulder and I feel more alone than ever. I could be at a gig, surrounded by a thousand sweaty people bashing into one another, and still, I'd feel alone. I'm completely numb, dead inside. And I don't know how to come back to life.

"Shh, shh," Mikey comforts me, sitting beside me and gangling his whole arm round my shoulders. "It's okay. It's gonna be okay." With his spare hand, he wipes blood mixed with tears from my cheek, and squeezes me tightly once, enveloping me in a lone but compassionate hug. I lean my head on his shoulder: salt water and blood ruin his already-ruined shirt. Why would anyone hurt my brother? How could they do it without killing themselves just to end the torturous guilt?

"I'm calling Frank," he decides, seemingly whimsical, but of course he's been having second and third and forth thoughts, so he probably thought of it about ten minutes ago. "You have his number, right?"

I nod, unable to function to retrieve my fortunately intact cell from my jeans pocket, never mind explain why Mikes shouldn't call him. I hope Frank doesn't shout at Mikey. I hope he understands. I hope he cares, actually cares, that we both could have just died.

Mikey smiles at something when he scrawls through my contacts, though God knows what, and then dials the number and waits. I want to cut the atmosphere with something, just to slice the tension, but there's nothing to cut it with.

"Hello...Yeah, um, it's Mikey...I was actually wondering...no, no, of course not! ...Well, yeah...See, are you busy? ...Why? Oh, it's kinda a long story, but...No, no. I already said, he wouldn't do that. Seriously...No...Jesus Christ, no! Look...Yes. Thank you...Um, I don't know, one minute: I think it's the end of our block...Yes. You know where? Oh, thank god...I will. Thank you...yeah, haha. Bye!"

He ends the call, turns to me, passes me the phone back and grins widely, like he might eat me. "Frank says to tell you 'Sorry about earlier, it was really all my fault. We need to talk about something important, but don't be worried. I'm sorry I lied to you.'" He pauses. "Make any sense to you?"

I only move my head in a way that could be a nod or a shake, and shrug my shoulders so that I'm hunched up, crawling inside of myself, gripping my torso so tight that my hugging fingers might snap like porcelain. Mikes seems to understand, and wraps his arms around me again. He talks to me, loud and blurred and fast, like he's high. "You alright?" I ask dully, voice dead and croaky like I'm ill. He nods.

"Of course! It doesn't hurt half as much as it did before, and..." he goes on to talk about something I don't understand, and he possibly doesn't either. I wonder if he's in shock, but I don't have much time to wonder, because Frank's car appears, almost unable to stop it's going so quickly. He pulls up smoothly yet wonkily on the sidewalk and strolls out to meet us, face intent but anxious, like his flesh is silently being sliced.

"Mikey? Gee? Gerard, are you okay? Is he okay?" he directs half of it to me, and half to my brother. Mikey stands, and giggles at something – definitely in shock.

"We're fine! At least, I am. I think it's mostly stopped bleeding, and it doesn't hurt at all now – I think the magic had something to do with it. Did you see, Gee? I mean, I didn't see it, but I'm sure it was there – I could feel its presence. The magic. I wonder what it was. I imagined it would be a unicorn, but I've never really been a unicorn person, so perhaps it was a fairy. Like a Christmas tree fairy...oh, all those spikes under her poor dress..." he continues to talk, and Frank bobs down next to me, holding my elbow to steady me or comfort me, maybe both.

He raises an eyebrow. "Is your brother high?" I laugh, but it's forced and jolted and jagged, so he continues: "I think I should take you to the hospital. You look like shit."

I shake my head in denial. "I'll be fine. Nothing broken, it just hurts a little. I'll be fine," I repeat, adding determinedly "We both will."

Frank nods then, and pulls me gently to my feet, wrapping his arm around the small of my back to make sure I don't fall over and die or something. "Mikes?" he calls, and, having captured his suddenly excitable yet child-like attention, he gets my brother to sit in the back of the car, shoving me in the front. "Okay?" he asks, and I nod. My brother starts talking about beer and endangered animals, so somewhere during the car journey I zone out, and eventually fall sluggishly asleep.

**(FPOV)**

I swallow hard. My throat burns from suppressing the urge to scream, my hands tingle from grasping the steering wheel so tightly, my eyes sting from not blinking, my chest is stone because I'm hardly breathing, and my heart aches every time I glance in Gee's direction. He is so beautiful. Why is he so injured? Who could bear to scar any inch of him? But every perfect inch seems indeed scarred: I wonder what he could have done for anyone to imagine he would deserve such horrendous punishment. Something deep inside of me bellows that I should turn right back round, walk straight into his house and give his parents a taste of their own medicine. But then I remember firstly, I couldn't beat them, and secondly, they let Mikey and Gerard go. Why did they let them leave? The curiosity kills me: I just have to find out. Surely the must be a reason for such insanity: or rather, sanity, amidst a whirlwind of insanity.

Mikey jumps around on the backseat, still hyperactive. I twist my head around to steal a glance of him, and we make eye contact in the rear view mirror. "Do you have any coffee?" he asks merrily, not stopping his bouncing to ask. I roll my eyes and hide a grin. He's so cute: at least it's stopping me from worrying about Gee...for about four seconds.

"I don't, Mikey, no," I reply, and I'm met with a forlorn face, quickly replaced by a near-constant giddy one.

"Can't you pull up?" he wonders, not demanding, simply inquisitive – something I can empathise with right now. I doubt he's usually so childlike, but it's adorable, so I almost wish he'll be like this forever. But then I remember that Gee's too exhausted and I'm too naive to act like a parent. So I cross my fingers that he'll be more normal in the morning.

"I really don't think you need any coffee, Mikes," I tell him, which earns me a betrayed expression that doesn't change nearly as swiftly as the first time. He chunters away in the back, but I ignore him, glad we're nearly at my house. For a moment, I wonder if I should take either of them to the hospital, but Mikey seems to be fine and Gee would kill me if I took him without his permission first. So I simply sigh, and promise myself I'll ask him when he wakes up.

Mikey bounds up the stairs and makes himself comfortable in the guest room before I invite him in – not that it bothers me, and at least it proves he isn't a vampire. Gerard remains sleeping, and I'd hate to wake him, so I nurse him in my arms instead. He's heavier that he looks, but it's worth it to see him bury himself in my chest. For once, I feel useful, like I'm doing a good thing. Also, I feel loved, because I close my eyes momentarily and imagine that he actually wants to be in my arms, and isn't just there because I have to move him. I smile until I remember the actual situation, and Gee sighs into me, his hair billowing out a little. Suddenly brace, I even kiss him on the head when I pull the duvet over his freezing, clammy body. I sigh when I realise he'll never feel the same.

***\_('.')_/***

**[ ]**

**/ \**

"Frank?" I'm woken by the sound of my name being spoken by a hoarse, pained voice. Gee, I realise. Yawning, I roll onto my side to find Gerard mirroring my position, so we end up face-to-face, only an inch or two between us. "Frank, I'm scared."

My breath is taken away by the sheer, sick beauty of his fear and vulnerability. I want to just scoop him back into my arms and run away with him, to somewhere he'll feel safe and no one will find us, ever. But I can't: I just frown and look, firm and reassuring, into his autumn eyes.

"What are you afraid of?" I'm scared myself: terrified I already know the answer. Sure enough, it's what I feared. How can someone so strong and gorgeous be afraid of such a pathetic monster? How can someone so old and stupid be such a tyrant? Why is Gee afraid of his Dad? I mean, it's obvious why – just look at what he did to Mikey and him! But why is he allowed to do that, what gives him the right to hurt or terrify anyone like that? Why is he scared of his father – because his father has no reason for what he's doing. He hurts his children over nothing. _Bastard_.

"He can't hurt you anymore," I tell Gee, my eyes and voice burning with something rich and roaring: with sincerity like liquid fire. "I promise," I continue, managing not to reach out and stroke his face. There's a moment of silence, and I feel a damp patch appearing where our faces are. Uncertain, I probe my own cheeks, but they're dry as bone. Gerard must be crying.

"Hey, hey," I soothe, patting his arm awkwardly for just a second. "Hey, it's okay. It's gonna be okay."

I don't shut up about how okay everything is gonna be until he falls asleep, tears still slipping and sliding down his innocent face.

Only a little while later, at just before six am, I'm woken again by the sound of screaming. My eyes open, my body jolts upwards into a sitting position and I turn to Gerard's quivering, sleeping body all in the space of a millisecond. I shake him gently in an attempt to wake him, but it doesn't work. So I speak instead: "Gee? Everything's alright. It's okay." This works, and his eyes flash open widely just as mine did, his pupils huge and frozen in fear and shock. "It's okay," I murmur again, before his screaming continues.

I try everything I can to get him to calm down, but nothing works. Murmuring to him sweetly, asking him firmly to be quiet, enquiring what's wrong, brushing his hair out of his teary face, circling his arms with my finger...eventually, I just pull his shaking body into my lap and rock him back and forth like a baby, letting him hide behind my hair and press his wet face against my ratty t-shirt. Breathing slowly, trying to get him to follow suit, I rub small circles into his back, trying to calm him down in any way I can. After about five minutes, he stops screaming, and simply sobs into my chest. Each sob seems to rip me in half, so I try to make him feel better, even if it's only for my own sake.

"He was here," he explains, without needing any prompting. All of his words are cliff-edge jagged because wails still tear through him, but his breathing slows to match mine and I keep rocking him, gripping him firmly but gently, in the hope he'll know he's safe now.

"And...and...and-and," he starts to hyperventilate again, so I mutter for him to shush until he feels better. A moment later: "And he-he was," Gerard takes a deep breath. "He came here, and you tried to protect me – you and Mikey – but he hurt you both, so you couldn't. And-and the whole time, he was shouting stuff at me – shouting everything at me – and it hurt, it really, really hurt, and-and and he just, he walked forwards, coming for me. So I closed my eyes, because I was scared, but when I opened them again, he was gone, and it was only you, Mikey and me. I was so relieved, but when I looked up at you again – you were him. It was like he was inside of you. And I was so, so scared..." He goes back to crying after finishing his muffled explanation.

"Don't let him hurt us," he begs.

I take a deep breath, but don't speak, just sit there, rocking back and forth the whole time. Not for a single second do I let go of Gee, until I move my hand from around his waist to his head, so I can brush away his soaked fringe from his eyes. When his face is clear, I breathe in again and hesitate, staring right into the depths of his amber eyes. They're so crystal and pure; it's almost as if I can see right through to his soul.

"Gerard, listen to me. You're going to be okay. I promise. You, Mikey...everything's gonna be fine. You can both stay here for as long as you want/need to, and after that, we'll sort something else out for you. I think you should go to the hospital, but you don't have to go if you don't feel like it. We'll get you all cleaned up later. Also, I think you should go to the police, because – _that man_ – does not deserve to be on the streets. But, again, it's your decision. No one's going to force you into anything. You can see that psychiatrist again if you need to, because I'm sure she'll be able to help with this. And if you're worried about Mikey, he's just next door. He's safe. You're both safe. And that isn't going to change ever again now, do you understand? We'll look after you. You'll get through this. One day, you'll _get better_. I promise. We'll survive this – all of us, everyone. It's going to be okay."

"Mikey?" he croaks. "Where is Mikey?"

"In the guest bedroom. It's just next to us."

There's a pause, before he furrows his brow and ponders, "You have a guest room? Why didn't I sleep there before? Y'know...the_ first_ time you rescued me." I feel almost proud at the end of his sentence: I've saved him at least three times now. I do have a purpose! But then I realise the rest of his query, so I'm occupied by fumbling for an excuse that might make sense to him.

"Um...ah...well, we'd just moved. It wasn't ready. We were still decorating, y'see..." It's clear in his incredulous eyes that he doesn't believe any of this for even a second. I chew on my lip, then explain.

"Well, the first reason was that I was afraid you'd go into shock or something, and I didn't want you to be on your own if that happened. So I kept you with me, to make sure you were safe. The second reason...and kinda the reason I wanted to keep you safe...um, Gee...Gee? Gee-Gerard Way, I kept you with me because I had a crush on you. I _fancied_ you – how pathetic is that? But I've moved on now...Not away from you, but more into you. I love you. Gerard Way, I am in love with you." I look down into the pillow, burying my shame in the bright white. "I'm sorry."

He reaches out with a trembling index finger, and I wonder what he's going to do, until he nervously and softly smoothes my fringe. Then he leans in, and for a dreadful second, I'm convinced he's going to hit me. But he doesn't. His rich scent – I can't pinpoint exactly what it is, but it features orange blossom, cinnamon, apple, vanilla and something like sunshine, like summertime – washes over my face, still boring into the bed, like a shadow. The aroma gets stronger and stronger until Gee's head is resting on the crook of my neck, and his beauty is choking me. Quicker than a dream, he whispers, "I love you too," and I don't have time to comprehend the message before his lips are crushing mine and my eyes squeeze themselves shut, revelling in the moment.

We kiss for what seems like an age, but is nowhere near long enough, but we're broken into two separate people – because, for a moment, it's as though we are wholly united, one complete being – by the door sliding open. It's quarter to seven, and Mikey's here, complaining that my alarm clock is in the guest room, and he can't get it to shut up. He gets half way through this sentence before pausing to absorb his surroundings. When he sees us, only just parting, our hands still entwined and Gee still leaning his entire body weight on me, he gasps. There's an awkward moment of prolonged silence before Gerard begins to laugh. It's infections, and I catch it and suddenly can't stop giggling. The feeling tumbles through me, filling me with joy whilst seeming to take a tonne off my shoulders – quite literally, it's easier to sit up now. Mikey soon joins in, and it's not long before we're all giggling noisily, gasping for air and unable to get enough.

This only continues until my Dad arrives, yawning and stretching, wondering what all the noise is. He asks, "Did my car move? I left it on the drive, but it's parked on the pavement now..." and then he notices the situation. "Well," he says. "This is nice." Gerard petrifies in my arms: everything stops: his breathing, blinking, maybe even his heartbeat. I press my ear against his chest to assure he isn't dead. There's a faint, fast heartbeat.

"Um, Dad...Gee and Mikey had to come, 'cause, like, they're Dad's an asshole. So, yeah, they're here now, and, um, me and Gee...well, yeah. We're, like...I don't really know how to explain it. We're not going out, but, like, we are. Does that make sense?" I don't know what to say, so I pause for half a minute, biting my lip until I accidentally draw blood. "It's really too big for me to explain properly."

There's a heavy silence. My Dad looks first confused, then happy, then worried, confused again, before he smirks like he knows something we don't. "That's what she said."

It's not even funny, doesn't fit well, and even if it made clear sense, it's too immature to be funny once you're over fourteen. But we still all break out into a second fit of laughter, four of us instead of three this time. When we eventually quiet down, Gee snickers and we're all off again. I laugh until it's painful, and then some. Finally, my Dad says, "I'm making eggs. You guys can come down...whenever you're, um, _finished_ up here." Gerard and I blush, Mikey snickers, and we all look around guiltily, without really feeling any remorse. The feeling of weightlessness is incredible: I've told Gerard straight (well, not exactly straight), he _loves me _the fuck_ back_, and my Dad doesn't even give a damn. This is fantastic. Can it get any better than this?


	8. I Don't Believe In Love

**VIII: I Don't Believe In Love**

**(FPOV)**

(One week later)

"Gee..." I drag out his name, so it's like a lullaby or a soft whine, and he looks up expectantly from his book. We're in my kitchen, supposedly doing homework, but I'm eating Lucky Charms, and Gee's reading _A Clockwork Orange_ – again. Fuck Math, right?

"Um, Lostalone are playing tonight, and, well, I was wondering..."

He interrupts me, tearing his gaze from his book unusually quickly. "Do we have tickets?"

I laugh at him, his childlike eagerness. It's so cute! Sickly, I almost want to hesitate just so I can stare at his wide autumn eyes and little half-open mouth. Is that weird? But his optimism starts to visibly evaporate, so I need to tell him. "Yes, we do. Do you, like, want to go, then?" Stupidly, I'm still anxious: it's not as if he doesn't like the band, but what if he doesn't like me? Why would he like me, and why would he want to go out with me? I've been terrified it was all a lie ever since he kissed me the second time.

"Well, duh! What time do the doors open?" He's like a child, with his eyes so happy and wide, and I want to go hug him closely, breathe in his sunshine scent, tell him that I really do love him. I want to hear the words back, too. This is wrong, because he's already said them – several times since he kissed me. I just want to believe them. But it's not as if I think he's lying to me or using me – if he says he loves me, I believe him. I do not doubt him in the slightest; I doubt myself.

"Six thirty," I answer boldly, the words coming from nowhere, almost mechanical. When he enquires about Mikey, I reply that he's already got tickets to see some local band – they're called Greentree, something like that. So that means it's just us two...all day. (Right now, Mikes is at the bookstore where he works – that's why Gerard's interest in reading has suddenly re-emerged).

"I need new clothes. Like, going out clothes. I can't keep wearing yours," Gerard frowns, downing his coffee in one. "Can we go to Hot Topic?" He's already standing: clearly, he's going whether I'm with him or not.

"'Course! I call dibs on the shower," I insist, jogging towards the staircase, my soggy cereal abandoned. Gerard scrapes his chair under the table.

"No way!" he cries, outrunning me. He gets the bathroom first. _Fantastic_, I think. _No shower_.

When Gee finally comes out of the shower, I run theatrically yet genuinely desperately into the bathroom before he grabs my shoulder, giggles and shakes his head, trying to keep a straight, serious face the whole time (and failing rather epically). "Nah-uh. It's one o'clock all ready. We have to leave here at six, so we have to be back at five, even if we eat out. We've only got four hours...it's an hour to town and back on the bus. You can shower tomorrow."

I humph, so he's aware of how put out I am, but I don't really care. My hair's always a little greasy, and at least I don't smell...yet. On that thought, I kick him out of my room – well, it's more our room nowadays – and douse myself in deodorant, flick my hair about with my fingertips until it looks better, and pull on an 'outside outfit' (ie, one which is fashionably, rather than accidentally ripped, and which I haven't been wearing all week). Gerard appears, shouting that it's now quarter past one, just as I'm tying my Converse. "Come _on_," he whines, emphasising the words painfully. "Let's _go_!"

We have to run for the bus, and it slams the door in our faces (I swear bus drivers get some sort of sick satisfaction from doing that) until Gee bounds down the street after it, banging on the door. I can't stop laughing at his face, or the bus driver's, and I'm literally holding my sides together when we get on. This makes everybody else stare at us, which makes me laugh even harder. The cycle continues...

Gerard finally pulls out my earphone – we're sharing his iPod – and nods at the door, standing to ring the bell. "Our stop," he sings, grabbing my hand when I stand too. I can't help myself from grinning like an idiot. When he sees, he squeezes my hand, and I flush pink and squeeze back. At the bus stop, he even kisses me, but then mutters, "We really have to hurry up...I desperately need new jeans. And boots. And t-shirts. And a Starbucks."

I laugh at his confused tone of voice when he says he wants coffee, and he drags me off with our fingers interlinked like a spider's web. Something superhuman takes over him, because nobody should be able to walk as quickly as he does now, not even on their way to Hot Topic. His legs move so quickly they almost blur, and his face looks pained in deep concentration. I lumber lazily and clumsily after him, having to jog to keep up. Finally, he stops, but only for a millisecond before he pulls me inside the store.

Three hours, two Starbuckses, nine stores and half a bag of McDonald's fries each, we clamber onto the bus together; I trip over Gee's shoelace and almost go through the screen in front of the driver. We collapse down the aisle, falling into two chairs near the back. The guy behind us – taking up the entire back row with his mustard chinos – pulls a face and mutters, "Faggots," as he moves as far away as he can – six rows forwards, on the other side. I ignore him, but Gee gives him the finger. It doesn't really bother me – sticks and stones, after all. Plus on the bright side, we get the back row to ourselves.

I make black coffee and cheese toasties while Gee gets changes, and run in the shower when he comes downstairs in his new outfit, before he can protest against it. If it kills me, I _will_ be clean. When I'm half-ready – just needing to do my hair and eyeliner and find a pair of shoes that can withstand the venue's notorious alcohol-and-pee-on-the-floor depths – Gee arrives, informing me that I simply _must_ straighten his hair. I sigh, smile, shrug, and eventually he's ready, so that I can get ready as well. I decide on my new Scumbag shirt, old, falling-to-pieces black skinny jeans, hi-top Converse (they're old enough to be sacrificed now) and my faux-leather jacket. There're about thirty button badges on it, of which Gerard decides to take a quarter to put on his t-shirt. His explanation/apology is a mad wide grin showing all his teeth, and I can only laugh. I guess I don't really mind...But he took all the best ones!

The gig is amazing, and the alcohol is cheap, and Gerard holds my hand all the way through it, engulfing me in his arms when everyone goes crazy; he kisses me whenever I have to shout in his ear. But that, surprisingly, is not the important part of the night. That comes afterwards: with Matt, Mikey (who is suitably pissed after his own concert) Ray, Bob, Elena (Bob's date – all five of them went with Mikes), Gee and I drooping over my couch – it's cosy, to say the least.

"I was reading this book," Mikey slurs to no one in particular, smiling to himself. "It's called...oh, what was it? By Irvine Welsh. Um...ah! Ecstasy: Three Tales of Chemical Romance. It's so good." Nobody responds, but we all turn to look at him, so he elaborates: "Well, it's basically just three short stories. The first one's okay, but it's not as good as the others. This woman – Rebecca? Rachel? something like that – has a stroke, and then she finds out about her porno-loving husband being a bit of a creep, so she and this seriously weird nurse get revenge on him, and there's this other dick in it, called Freddy, and – ugh! It's horrible! It's just so good though. The third one's similar – it's good too – but the second one's my favourite:"

"Wow," Gee says, "It sounds awesome. Can I borrow it? Please?" He sounds all excited at the end; it makes me giggle. But he's right. It does sound good. Even the name's fantastic.

"Um, sure," his brother replies. "I mean, I borrowed it from the book store – I don't know if I'm actually allowed to do that or not – but I'd lend it to you. As long as no one tried to order it while you had it, it'd be fine. I'll bring it on Monday."

Gee nods toward him, suddenly distant, and asks, completely out of the blue: "If you had a band, what would you call it?"

Nobody answers, shocked or thinking, so I reply, "The band I used to be in were called Pencey Prep, as in _The Catcher in the Rye_. And I can't really think of any others. I kinda like LeATHERMOUTH, y'know, with a small 'e' and a crossy thing through the 'o'? It's not really something I'm good at, though, coming up with names like that."

Ray says, "I like The Black Parade. And I don't know where that came from."

Mikey: "Bullets? Ecstasy? ...Ooh! What about something from that? The book, I mean! Like...we could have...um, Ecstasy, or Three Chemical Romances, or..."

"My Chemical Romance," finishes Gee. "That's exactly what I was thinking!"

There's a silence: a long, honey-like silence, dripping with gooey expectancy. Finally, Gee does it. He does what everyone's been waiting for someone, anyone to do. "My Chemical Romance...Who's in?"

"Me," Mikey says first.

"Me!" I cry back, too excited.

"I am!" Ray hollers, louder than me.

"Me too," adds Gerard.

Bob and Matt look at each other. They mutter. Finally, "Um, me," from Matt. This doesn't surprise me. I've not known them so long, but Matt is more adventurous that Bob, and the idea of possibly maybe one day but not really being famous probably terrifies Bob. He broke my camera when I went near him.

Everyone turns to Elena. "Well, don't look at me," she drawls. "I can't even play anything!"

We sleep – all of us – in my living room, on the floor or sofas in sleeping bags, like at Ray's. When I think everyone's asleep, Gee shuffles along the floor to meet me. Soon, our hands are touching, and then, more than that. He kisses my forehead, my lips, and moves to my chest, but I push him away. He looks up at me with fragile eyes, and I just shake my head. I've realised something. Today's...what day is it? I ask him as much.

"Saturday," he replies. "Why?" Obviously, I look as confused as I feel. "Are you okay, sweetie?" he asks me, touching my forehead gently like he might telepathically connect with me to see the problem.

"When did you say your next appointment with the psychiatrist is? Surely it should be today...but you didn't go to one..."

"I, um...no, it's...next week. Yeah, it's next week."

There's a silence. I'm afraid to ask it. But..."Was it a man or a woman?"

"Uh, woman."

I think for a moment. "Did you miss your appointment on purpose? Don't you like her? She didn't upset you, did she? Cause we can find you a new one if she did..."

"No!" he shouts at me, and I wince, curling in on myself protectively, like his words are daggers and could slice through my stomach. "Just leave it, Frank." With that, he turns over, and falls asleep soon enough, though his breathing isn't even. I wonder if he's just pretending, so he doesn't have to talk to me. Biting my lip so hard blood washes briefly over my teeth, I bury my face in my pillow so I can sob in peace without anyone else hearing.

A few minutes, or hours, or maybe days later, Gee shuffles back across to me. "Are you crying?" he whispers, and I can't tell if his tone is tender or sarcastic. Wary of both, I stay silent. When I don't reply, he states: "You're so sensitive." I don't know if this is a criticism or just an observation. Am I too sensitive? Is it bad? Doesn't he like it? Doesn't he like _me_?

I still don't speak, and I guess the frosty silence bothers him somewhat. All I can focus on is the perpetual fear he really doesn't like me, and the sound of the blood pounding quickly and noisily in my ears, and my ragged torn breaths. Finally, he says, "Frank, I can't keep lying to you."

Well, this is it. He's going to dump me. He's going to fucking dump me. Fantastic. I'm in fucking love, and I find out he's fucking gay, and everything's fucking alright, but no, no, it's got to go fucking wrong. Everything has to go fucking badly. Just my fucking luck.

fuck

I bury myself back in the pillow. The pillow is a much nicer place to be. There's no hurt or confusion or, indeed, love in the pillow. It's much better than reality.

"Frank..." Here it comes! "I never saw the psychiatrist."

...Wait? ...What? ...I...what...no...don't...understand...what...I...wait...no..._what_?

My first feeling is confusion. Then comes joy. He loves me. Still loves me. Actually loves me. And, I, of course, love him. With all my heart. Which leads to the next emotion...worry. Betrayal. _Anxiety_. He...he lied to me. Worse than that, he's sick. And it seems like he doesn't care; doesn't want to make himself better. Doesn't want to get better...this is bad. Very bad. He's sick. He needs _help_. Then I'm angry. He lied to me. He doesn't even want to get better, he doesn't even care. And why should I care when he doesn't? I'm wasting my time!

"I'm sorry."

He's so timid and vulnerable, what can I do to hurt him? Of course, nothing at all. I turn back to him and we hug on the floor, and now everything seems solved, even though it isn't. All the fiery anger inside me has been extinguished, and he melts into me.

He sighs into me, and I stroke his hair, running my fingers through it like a comb. The cold, delicious silkiness washes over my sweaty hands like liquid, and I close my eyes and let my head roll backwards. Everything's fucked up. But I'm tired. Gerard is at my side, what can go wrong? It'll all be fine, right?

"It's all going to be okay now," I promise him, wondering if he's sick of hearing that yet. I hope he isn't. I hope he still believes it, even just a little bit. Doesn't he have faith in me, at least, to make it okay?

"I know." He sounds strangely satisfied. This must be a good thing. "I love you, Frankie." I think that I believe him too. Not that he'd lie to me, I just always thought maybe he meant it, but wouldn't mean it soon. But...he means it. I know that he means it.

"Love you too, sweetie."


	9. Hear Me Out

**IX: Hear Me Out**

**(GPOV)**

**1 week later**

"Frank..." I whine, rolling over until I fall out of bed. The thud wakes him up, and he sits up, blanketed with the duvet so it looks like a toga, peering over at me. I stare at him for a moment, and then he bursts out laughing hysterically. "What?" I ask, furrowing my brow in confusion.

"You..." he snorts. "Nothing, just that, well, you..." again, he falls back onto his front, giggling into his pillow. Finally, he sits up straight and points out: "You have a pair of underpants on your head."

"What the...?" I wonder – I mean, how the fuck did they get there? "Whose are they?" I ask, raising my eyebrow in scrutiny.

"Um...mine, I think," mumbles Frank, and laughs again. He looks so adorable peeking out at me, face half-submerged in the whiteness of the bed.

I pull them off my head and sniff. "Well, at least they're clean."

This sets him off again, and it's a whole ten minutes before he calms down enough to note my anxiety. When he does see though, he immediately quizzes, "What's wrong, Gee?" his voice raising in curiosity and worry.

"I...the appointment's today." To avoid having to meet his eye and revealing how terrified I really am, I twiddle my thumbs and chew on my lip, trying to act like it's nothing. At once, he understands what I mean, and why I'm blatantly (the attempt at a disguise is a valiant yet failed one; even I can tell I look frightened) so scared.

"Hey, Gee." His voice is soft and gooey like honey, and it makes me feel instantaneously better – though the fear cannot be shaken from me. "It'll be okay, I swear. There's nothing to worry about."

"But..."

"Shh, now. There's nothing to worry about."

Oh, but he's so wrong. So, so, so wrong. And I want to tell him. I want to shout it and scream it and write it all over the walls and whisper it and get it tattooed on my fucking forehead. There is so much to worry about.

"Frank..."

He gives me a long, exasperated look, but his voice his patient and gentle. "What is it, honey? What's wrong?"

_What's right_? I think, but I say nothing. Instead, I look at the floor again, nibble my fingernails again, just for good measure, and finally let out a drawn-out sigh. "I have to tell you something. Something bad. I need your help, but...But I'm scared."

This time, his chocolate eyes melt and his entire gaze softens, like this will somehow ease my stress. "Hey, Gee, you don't have to be afraid of me. You can tell me anything, you know that."

"Fine, then." Here goes. "I...I..." words fail me. How do you phrase something like this? It's too hard! I can't get my head round any of it at all.

"I cut myself."

Oh. That's how you phrase it. The words are out of my mouth before I even know I'm speaking, never mind registered what I might say.

It seems that everything in the world stops. I don't breathe. Frank doesn't breathe. Silence shadows us, the only exception being the slow, dull tick of the clock, forcing us back into reality yet also making it seem like time has at least slowed, even if it hasn't actually halted.

"Bye!" Frank's Dad's shout brings us rushing back to real reality, not the pseudo world I have created for us. We sigh, neither of us having the strength or capacity to shout back, and Frank whispers when he talks, as though his voice has been stolen from him.

"So did I."

I'm too shocked to be shocked, if that makes any sense at all. It takes me only a minute to etch his words into my brain, then I start with the questions, an endless stream of enquiries. "Since when? When did you stop? Why did you stop? Who made you stop? What did you do it with? What triggered you? Did you have a ritual? Would you cut again, if you thought it'd help?"

I finally breathe, having said all this in the space of about ten seconds. Frank gives me a long, hard look – not an angry one, just pensive – and then begins to answer, slowly and methodically, like it's a chant.

"I started when I was thirteen. I'd wanted to for a long time. I stopped lots and lots of times; the most recent was my sixteenth birthday: fresh start, won't cut. And it was hard, especially for the first two days. It was horrendous; I was sure I'd fail. Then I met you, and something seemed worthwhile after all. Nobody really made me stop, only myself. I'd told my Dad and my 'best friend' about it, but my Dad'd just ask how I was sometimes: he didn't really know how to deal with it, bless him. My 'best friend' fell out with me over something pathetic. And...he told everyone. I quit going to school. My grades dropped from mostly As – apart from history, I hated that – to mostly Bs, then mostly Cs, then mostly Ds – apart from history, I failed that. I started off doing it just with a razorblade. But the worse the bullying got, the more I felt I had to do it. It became an addiction – it does that, doesn't it? Gets inside your head, as well as outside you. When I fell out with Quinn, it got even worse. I mean, I'd do it with anything, and anywhere. Back at my old home, I went to Catholic school, so we had this really shitty uniform. Tie and blazer and everything. I used to like having the blazer; it covered everything up. I ended up doing it at school a lot. It hurt most there. There wasn't much of a trigger, really. I felt the same all the time, so nothing much changed. I just cut whenever I felt more like it: usually, that was when I remembered something about Quinn. There was a ritual at first, but it soon ended. I couldn't keep up with myself; I couldn't limit myself to only one part of my body, like I'd promised myself I would. I don't cut anymore, no, and I wouldn't dream of doing it nowadays. Or...I suppose I would, that's a stupid thing to say. But I'd try my best not to. It's easier to find alternatives after you've gone cold turkey. But it sure as hell drives you crazy first."

There's a pause. "Now you have to answer all that for me," he breathes, and my breath is knocked from me at his sheer beauty. _I wasn't expecting that_, I think. _Not at all_.

"But...you're so...confident about it...and I...I..."

"Gerard, you listen to me. You have nothing to be afraid of. I love you, okay? And you can say whatever you need to. If you're scared about it, tell me. But you have to tell me. It's the only way..."

"Fine," I grumble, more to myself than anyone else. Then I begin.

"I don't remember when I started. I just can't imagine any of my life spent without being consumed by it. But I do remember the first time I went 'too deep'. I...Um, so I've stopped a couple of times, but it's too hard. I sound like a complete wimp now, but I just can't stop. My skin itches for it. I usually do it with, um, a pair of scissors. I mean, it's easier than trying to pull my razor apart. I think so, anyway...There are no specific triggers, like you. But I don't just do it anywhere. I keep a tally on my arm in the day, and then I do it at home because I have this ritual...speaking of which...I have to listen to the same music all the time, and I time myself, so the cuts get deeper and more frantic every time, and I can't eat or drink first, or afterwards – for about an hour, probably. Just...loads of little things, that make it routine. It does help. It puts me back in control. It reduces the emotional pain. Really, it's wonderful. The only thing is that it permanently destroys your body whilst temporarily saving your mind."

"Where? And when was the last time?"

I don't like this, no. Too many questions. It hurts to answer them. "My leg...legs...and it was...the day before I met you. You make it hurt less." The last part seems the most shameful of all, and I duck my head and mumble. Frank sighs again and sits up all the way, swinging his own legs over the bed and crouching to sit by me. He holds my hand.

"Everything's gonna be okay now. It won't hurt anymore."

***\_('.')_/***

**[ ]**

**/ \**

**(FPOV)**

The psychiatrist tells me I can't go in. But Gerard gives me such a long, pleading, desperate look that I ignore her and take Gee's hand, motioning for him to enter her office first, and pull the chairs closer together so we're almost touching. He looks at me, not at her, and he doesn't let go of my hand.

"So, Mr Way..." she begins, looking down on us both through rectangular red glasses that keep sliding down her nose, "I hear you want to talk to me."

Gee swallows, looks around the room – everywhere apart from the other two people – and finally nods, moving his head so very little that you have to squint to double check he isn't just looking at something else.

"Have you ever seen another doctor about anything like this?" she asks, her gaze hard, like she's undressing him. Not sexually, but more like she's peeling off his clothes to get to his skin, seeing the scars there and tearing it off to get to the fat that's only natural that he thinks is wrong, and then to the muscle and to the blood vessels and the veins and arteries and capillaries and the bones and the organs until the only thing left is his brain, which she gets to pick and pull and poke apart until she's satisfied she knows how he thinks.

Again, Gerard refuses eye-contact with anyone but the books and vases and curtains and carpet. But his shake is more distinct this time, almost resolute, as if he's stubborn and is quite determined he'd never get any sort of help whatsoever.

Her gaze is still hard, but her tight mouth and upright posture seem to soften a little, like somebody blurred the sharp lines of a hurried sketch. "Let's start with something a little easier, then. I'll tell you five things about myself, and you tell me five things about yourself. We'll work from that."

I turn away from her to watch Gerard's masked, then not-so-masked, then blatantly horrified face. His stare meets mine, and his grasp on my hand tightens so much I'm surprised all the bones in my hand don't shatter.

"It's okay," I mouth to him under my breath, and he leans forward to hear me better. This is when the psychiatrist apparently notices my presence – like she couldn't see me all along.

"Um, Mr Way, it really is advisable that your friend stays outside."

Fear really grips him now. His eyes almost pop out of their sockets, they're so wide, and all of the rosiness – not that there was much to start with – drains out of his face, leaking like blood onto the floor. I'm sure my hand breaks.

"I think I might stay, actually." My tone is curter than I intend it to be, but it does the trick. "If you don't mind."

"Well, I do actually mind, but I'll let you off just this once. Next time, though, you really can't join us. But if it helps the patient, who am I to disagree?"

Gerard calms down only marginally. "Stay?" I'm not sure if this is a question, a plea, a demand or a command. I nod obediently regardless of whatever he means. Does it matter? I'm overanalysing everything.

After that, he does relax a little, sinking into the back of the chair and loosening his steel grip on my now-white hand. But he still answers begrudgingly, muttering his answers, rejecting any signs of gentleness she shows and looking around the small but airy office with hard, shallow, furious eyes. He stays like this until she asks about me.

"So who's this guy you've got with you? Your friend, or...?"

He smiles, looks at me, looks down at his feet, crossed at his knees, then his ankles, then his knees again. "He's my, um, best friend. And my boyfriend. Sort of. Yes." He looks at me, and I smile back at him, squeezing his hand. "Yes. My boyfriend," he echoes himself.

"So was it his idea for you to come here?" she probes, and Gee looks at me for guidance. I simply nod, squeezing his hand again. I mouth 'it's okay' at him, but I doubt he believes me.

"I suppose...yeah."

"And that means he already knows everything?"

Gerard pauses for a long time. It feels like an age. "Yes," Is all he says.

"Well, then. If you can tell him, surely you can tell me." He doesn't speak; she leans forward in her chair, interlocking her fingers on her desk and letting her auburn hair fall into her face. "Gerard. Do you mind if I call you that...? I'm being paid to help you. Let me help you. Please. I've seen far too many people like you, in your situation, with your kind of problems, with so, so much potential in life go to waste. They lie. They do irrational things that get them in jail, or thrown out of school, or even dead. I cannot let that happen to anyone else, okay? This is getting too personal now, but I want you to have my number. You got a problem? Tell your boyfriend. Or call me. Either is fine, just don't keep it bottled up. You must not keep anything like that a secret anymore, okay? I know what's wrong with you. You have nothing to hide. Nothing to be ashamed of. And it's half past now." She slides a business card across her desk. "There's my number. Use it, if you think you need to. I'll see you in a fortnight."


	10. You're A Heart Attack In Black Hair Dye

**X: You're A Heart Attack In Black Hair Dye**

**(GPOV)**

We stumble out of the office still holding hands. I wouldn't let go of Frank's fingers for the world now, and I think I'd die if I stopped grasping them. For a second, he lets go, and I prepare to keel over and mutter my last words, until he gives me his other hand to hold and wraps the arm that was first holding me around my waist. I lean into him, and he kisses my cheek, but then I have to stand up straight because it hurts to bend my neck like that, and he's not really tall enough for it. So he leans into the crook of my neck, kissing it as he does. This works much better.

By this time, we're outside, and Frank looks up at me. "Do you want to go home?" he asks gently, tucking his other hand under my arm and pulling me into a hug.

"No, I can't stand to just..." I sigh, not knowing what it is exactly that I can't stand. "Can we do something else? Go out?"

Frank squeezes me tight, then releases me, but keeps hold of my hand. "We should go to the cinema," he says, his lips parting so his mouth's half open, making me bite my own lip. "I mean, if you want to."

I nod. Of course. "I want to." It doesn't feel like a psychiatrist just made me feel about _this_ big. Or that everything hurts. Or that I feel I should be angry at Frank for never telling me he used to cut; angry at myself for not noticing. I feel...empty. Hollow. That's not a bad thing, either.

"Gerard," he states dully, just as we begin walking again, our fingers still interlinked. I'm not letting go of him for anything, not for the fucking world. "I love you." His voice is bland, matter-of-fact, but his opal eyes glint with such a strange, alive brightness that I don't doubt for even a second the sincerity or passion behind the admission. This is new. New for me, for him, too, I'm sure. This feeling of absolute true love. This feeling of being absolutely truly loved.

I don't want to walk to the cinema; Frank has to drag me there. Really, I'd much rather just stare down into his deep glittery eyes and hold hands and exchange body heat and probably kiss a little (okay, a lot) too. But there are horror movies and action movies and Disney movies and popcorn, and before I've fully engaged in reality, we're sitting in two ripped red chairs, staring at opening credits and sharing ice cream. I don't even know when I started eating it.

From what I can gather, the movie is about zombies and people dying and some girls with big boobs running around after some men with big muscles who protect the girls and kiss them a lot, and then a lot more of those people die too. To be honest, I don't really know what it's about. I can't concentrate; I'm too busy touching my abdomen to see if I can find my insides for the first part of the movie. As for the second half...it's Frank's fault I'm not paying attention.

"Mmm...mmm...come here...oh..."

Someone shushes us. I realise it sounds like we're having sex...and then I wish we were.

"Frank..." We get shushed again, louder this time. His arms wrap around me, and I pull him tight, so both of us end up squished against the armrest. He wrestles me to move it so we can touch properly, but we only end up pushing away from each other. Ha. It's like a metaphor, but in reality, it's just irritating. Finally, the woman behind has had it and she hits us in between our two touching heads with her handbag. Bitch. We leave, fleeing anywhere but there. At least we can reach each other now.

We move outside, though walking is hard, because I'm pretty much fastened to him. His lips are soft against my chapped rough ones, dancing around his like sandpaper. His face is just as soft, and warm, and his hair is silky when I grasp it. He grabs my hair too, tugging at the ends a little so that my chin tilts upwards. I bend my knees a fraction until we're at equal heights, and he pulls me closer to him again. I have to pause for breath. We're only three feet away from the entrance to the cinema. I can see the woman behind the counter through the glass, and she's staring at us. And then I forget everything, because Frank's lips are on mine again, and it's just so...so _Frank_.

Somebody coughs loudly, so we have to move out of the way again, twirling around each other to get away from the door. But I don't hear the door open, and there are certainly no footsteps. A minute passes, maybe two, or maybe it's just a second – it's hard to keep track of time with these lips on mine – and then they cough again. A third cough forces us to hesitate, pull slightly away from each other – our hands still entangled and entwined in the other's hair – to look what their fucking issue is.

And then, when I look, everything stops. All of time and space, and the universe, and the time-space continuum thing, and...and...I stop; I don't breathe or blink, and I'm pretty fucking sure my heart has stopped beating. No need to resuscitate me, honey.

There's a man there, coughing at us. He's not that tall, but he's taller than me. His face has deep lines scored across it, some long and deep and some only little creases. They're not wrinkles, though. No way. They're scars. Long, short, deep, shallow, red, purple, faded, new. What does it matter? They're all scars. His face is so disfigured, it looks like a roadmap. A roadmap of fights? Besides that, his face is quite young – he's got clear skin, but deep black bags under his eyes. I'm sure I recognise him from somewhere, the voice of the cough seems daringly familiar, something I wouldn't forget. I stare at him for a long moment, trying to deduce where I may know him from. Not school, not a band, and not anywhere else I can think of, either. Then it dawns on me, staring into his flat brown eyes, not at all like Frankie's deep chocolate ones.

What does it matter what his eyes are like? What does life matter, or death? Because you surely know who it is by now, watching us make out, coughing over us. He looks fierce. Like he might kill somebody. Like he wants to kill somebody. Like he's already killed lots of somebodies.

It's...it's...he's here...here...with Frank...he might hurt Frank...and me...I know that he recognises me, even though it was so dark and so scary. Surely he must remember Frank too, with his fucking bin lid. If I can't forget his face, why would he forget mine? And his dark, shadowy, now clear, face – his voice, everything about him, even his posture, his movements – is etched into my skull. I know this man. And he knows me.

He's here. With Frank, and with me. If he lays a finger on him, I swear...

But what good am I? I cannot defend against this man, even if he doesn't have a gun this time.

Fuck that! He's here! HERE! Right here, right now!

And what am I gonna do about it?

I'm just gonna stand here and wait for him to kill us both.


	11. If You Sing These Words

**XI: We're Never Leaving this Place Alive (But if you Sing these Words, We'll Never Die)**

**(GPOV)**

About a second passes. Maybe two. Maybe even three. Perhaps it's only half a second. But then again, I suppose it could be a year, the way the time seems to drag by, leaden, taunting me with its slow motion.

Frank doesn't understand at first – like me, he recognises the guy, but has no idea where from – but from the look on my face, and on the other man's, he works it out. He grips my wrists, lets his mouth fall open and bends down, so his coat skims the floor. What is he doing? I have no clue. And then he screams.

He screams so loud it nearly deafens me, screams so everyone within a mile radius turns to stare, screams so his hands, clutching my wrists, vibrate, screams so his eyes seem to become even wider than his mouth, with the shock and the effort of it all. And that condemns us. Maybe he'd have let us go. Not likely, but still a definite _maybe_. But not now. He'll have to kill us now. Not to mention all the people there.

"Fuck, Frank..." I say, sigh, cry, but it's too late. He's done it now; everyone's heard now. It's been done: it can only be forgiven, not forgotten. But I don't see this guy being terrifically forgiving, if I'm honest with you.

"That was a silly thing to do," mutters the man, and Frank falls all the way to the ground – only about half a foot from his current position – and buries his head in his knees. They stare. Everybody stares. Yet nobody, not one single person, comes over to help. I don't even see anyone calling 911. Nope. Not one person...I scan the gathering crowd again and again. Mad world.

"Fancy going somewhere a little more...private?" This isn't a question, it's blatantly obvious. It's a command. Frank stands when I force him to, and he half-stumbles, and I half-carry him down the alley. I turn back in time to see a posh-looking woman in her fifties or sixties with eighty three million dogs calling someone on her cell. I thank her telepathically, even though it's quite likely she was already on the phone, or has called someone else to tell them what she's just seen. Not that there was much to see. That comes next.

We walk down this alley, littered with everything from broken sofas to candy wrappers, with dark dank walls covered in fading graffiti and muddy puddles gathering at the bottom of the walls. Drainpipes drip randomly, making ominous echoing noises when they plop on the floor.

He hits me before I even know what's happening. One moment, I'm struggling my way down a dirty alleyway, the next I'm on the floor of the dirty alleyway with his hi-top on my head. My chest kills from the impact of the concrete, my lip is bleeding, my temple is likely to be crushed any moment now, and I swear to God that there's so much grit in my eye, I'd be half-blind if I wasn't face down on the floor.

I try to turn my head – in response, he just stands on my face – but nonetheless my eye half-opens (I'm not blind, but it is blurry) and I get a good, smudged look at his face.

But then he lets me go. Because Frank is saving me, again. There's a fucking bin lid, of all things, like déjà vu, in his hand, and it would appear he's beating the attacker with it. While he's doing this, I stare right at him, my vision still shitty. I try to stand, too, but I just fall back on my face, landing on my arm. Something cracks. I know it isn't broken – doesn't hurt enough for that – but my elbow feels seriously weird.

**(FPOV)**

He turns on Gee. I know right from the start he has no chance. This man, even without the gun, is terrifying. He's clearly over 6 foot, weighs probably twice what Gee does and has muscley arms the size of my thighs. Last time, he probably didn't even need the gun. Pushing whoever it was that he killed over would have been enough to kill them.

Gerard backs up against the wall, fear half-paralysing him so he seizes up and moves rigidly like a robot. I try...to move...to think...to breathe...but everything...becomes...so...imp...imp...impossible. I...can't...even...th...think...any...more...so...it...I...Gerard...Gerard...Ge...rard...Ge...

"FRANK!" pulls me out of the stupor. Thinking is impossible, but right now I don't have a choice. I just have to think. Simple as. Otherwise, we'll both die. Gerard needs me. I need to think.

"FRA-ANK!" The scream is broken in two, and I notice that somewhere during the shriek, he falls to the floor, clutching his stomach. My face is wet. I don't realise that I'm crying, though. Am I crying? What are tears? What are their purpose?

Again, thinking is blurred, slurred, like I'm drunk or high or concussed. Everything is tingly, almost numb. Soon I'll be paralysed. What then? I know the answer. It's just that, for once, it seems like a curse, not a solution. I wish there was another way. That's new to me. Death. Funny, isn't it? When you want it, you can't have it, and when you have it, you don't want it.

"FRA-!" His cry is cut short. Again, the shock of this drags me quickly out of my grey cloud of sombre thought. What's the point, anyway? What's the point in thinking?

I can't let myself fall back down that hole of musing, so I blink, shake my head, and take a deep breath, like that'll make it go away. Then I open my eyes wide, take another one or two or nineteen deep breaths, and face Gerard, bleeding, mangled, crying for me, laying on the floor, slumped against the graffiti-covered wall helplessly. His face is red with the fresh blood, black with dried blood, purple with new bruises forming like flowers or fruit.

The man, the man without his gun, he doesn't stop. Gerard screams, I scream, but nobody hears, and he doesn't hesitate for even a moment. With his fists, his feet, his knees and elbows and with just growls and grunts and hisses, he vents everything that's ever angered him on poor Gee. And what do I do about it? Stand there, dazed, terrified, whilst he shouts at him. I mean, c'mon. I could at least call 911. But my hands: they just won't operate.

"The – the police – police! Your fault!" he screams at Gerard, voice getting shriller like a banshee. "Nearly – caught me! You dick! I'll kill you! You and your boyfriend, damn it! You dick!"

This does it for me. Not because I'm mentioned. Because of the name calling. Because I can identify with being beaten up; I know how that feels, but I have no clue what the man's motives are, other than imminent capture by the cops. Has he been stalking us? Is this a coincidence? I know one of us – both of us, probably – is going to die, and I can't get my head around that, really. But I can understand the name calling thing. And enough is enough.

"Get off my Gerard." My voice is nothing but a whisper; he doesn't even acknowledge he might have heard anything. I say it louder, almost a command, and louder still, nearing a shout, and then as loud as I can, with all the air in my lungs, so it's louder than the sound of the traffic and the people right down the alley in the street and the cries of my beaten boyfriend and the pounding sound of constant punches, unrelenting.

And as I launch myself on top of the attacker, trying to get a grip around his neck, managing to choke him for about ten seconds before he forces me off him, turns, and starts on me, I think how strange it is. The first time I saved him from this man, I got us both safely away. This time, I'm going to die, and if he doesn't run now, so will Gerard. I wonder why no one can hear us screaming. What brought us together – the man with the gun – is now tearing us apart – killing us both. We came back around the starting point of the circle. It was a nice circle, I must admit, though not very even. The cutting and bulimia and his parents and the psychiatrist on one side...but the forest and the half-formed band and shopping and gigs and saving each other and life and love on the other. I love you, I think towards him, but my view is blocked by punches so I can't see his response. And it was worth it, to die, because I got to love you.

He doesn't seem to receive my thoughts.

For a moment, I wonder if it's strange that I don't seem to be able to feel his punches and claws and bites and kicks. But then I look down at myself, and up at his face, and I listen carefully. Somebody is screaming and crying. I think it's me. Plus, when I think of it, I'm in agony. Everywhere hurts. Nothing can be soothed, either. Why is he doing this? I mean, I know why he's killing me – us – but why this way? Clearly, he has a gun. And...he could kill us in one move if he wanted, we all know that. Maybe he's just trying to drag it out. We'll die in agony. Nice thought to be having at seventeen.

And then, I really don't know. The punches and smacks and kicks and bites and scratches and claws and scars and Indian burns turn into one. The screams blend together to make a shrill sound that will never ever cease. It hurts, I realise, too late. The physical pain, and the emotional pain of leaving Gerard. It hurts so much, the thought of it...

I want to bellow at Gee to run. I want to run myself, flee, escape from this horrendous death. But I can't. I want to just be anywhere away from here with Gee's hand in mine. Yet I want it to end. The pain, it should stop soon. I'll be dead. At least it won't hurt then.

All of these thoughts blend into one long stream, a white stream, like a cloud or a trickle of water. The cloud and the water float away from me – must be a cloud – and I think I outstretch my hand to try to grab it back, but I glance down and see both my hands lying limp besides me. I look around for Gerard, but he isn't there. Neither is the bastard. Have they both left me? Is Gee okay?! Or...the cloud sinks a little as it is overloaded with another thought. What if I've left them? Where _am_ I?!

The sky is pale blue, but it turns to white and blends with the cloud. The cloud grows, or the rest of the world shrinks, and the white creeps down the horizon, covering everything in its path. Soon, the white is the only thing I can see, and I can't hear or smell or taste or feel anything. Gradually, a dull yet rapid – as though it's coming from far away – beeping noise punctures the silence, and I smell gasoline, and I taste blood in my mouth, salty and rusty, and I feel...fuzziness running through my veins. Then the whiteness returns, and it's all I can do to not surrender. But slowly, the surrender comes for me, not the other way around, and I fall into complete oblivion. The whiteness is now black. Nothing is anything.


	12. If You Say 'Goodbye' Today

**XII: If You Say "Goodbye" Today**

**(GPOV)**

**2 weeks later**

I wake up in the chair. My face is still sore, my arm throbs monotonously and my fingers feel useless and heavy like lead. But then I glance over to my left, and I can't concentrate on myself anymore. Because I am injured and, yes, it hurts. But he is broken. And he won't wake up.

My right arm is in a sling, but I reach over with my left to hold his hand. I look desperately for a response: a squeeze, a flicker of his eyelid, a change in his heart rate, blasting out across the room like a radio, but there's no difference in him. "I love you," I tell him, but it all goes to waste. He can't hear me. He can't know I love him. And, when he wakes up, he won't even love me back. It's my fault he's here. My fault he can't breathe right. My fault they had to sew his fucking insides up in surgery. My fault his face – and all of his exposed skin, for that matter – is black and blue and purple and green and yellow with ripe bruises. It's been two weeks, and it's still my fault. It will never not be my fault.

There's a flicker, then, his eyelashes. I swear they move, like half a closed-eye blink. But nothing escapes the scrutiny that follows my hunch, and there's no further movement. So I speak. I tell him. Because otherwise, he'll never hear it. By the time he wakes up, I'll be insane, probably dead. Suicide...I forgot about wanting that, once, with him. Now it's like before. The prospect never flees my thoughts.

With the non-broken fingers on my left hand, I squeeze his hand – the one, of course, that isn't broken. From head to toe, I look him up and down and up and down. He's still beautiful. Just...broken, as well. His chest rises and falls unevenly because of the two broken ribs on the left from CPR, and the three on the right from being beaten up; there're still stitches on his head from the deep cut there – it slammed against a wall – his arm is in a sling because the collarbone is broken; there's saline and blood and God knows what else being pumped into him on IV lines; and, worst of all, there are stitches and scars on his abdomen from where they fucking operated. His kidney was damaged. It was bleeding. Bleeding inside of him. They had to sew his fucking insides up.

"Frank..." And then I blanch, because I have no idea what to say. I just murmur the first thing that comes into my head, like he's a psychiatrist.

"Frank, I'm sorry. This is my fault. It's all my fault. My fault he had a grudge against us. My fault he attacked us. My fault you had to step in. My fault you got hurt. You tried to help me, Frank. I know you did. And you saved my life. Twice, now. Three or four times, definitely. But...why? Why would you do that? I'm nothing to you." There's a pause. "I should be nothing to you."

I'm still holding his hand, and his fingers flutter against my palm, like a dying butterfly's frantic but sluggish movements. His eyelid twitches, too, like it might just open, and I lean forwards, anticipant, in my seat, so far that the back legs come off the floor. I've seen too many movies. I know that now is the time he'll wake up and smile, and I blink to make sure it's real and then thank god. He'll grin at me weakly, and I'll laugh aloud and squeeze his hand and cry because I'm so happy. Frank gets to be all ill and dramatic, and I get to be all happy and anxious and desperate and, yes, dramatic. But...no. Just...no. I've seen too many movies, got the plot all wrong. His hand stops fluttering, and his face goes back to the tranquil soft statue.

"Well, don't you want to know what happened, Frankie?" I ask, though he probably can't hear me and definitely can't respond. "It was weird, really. I missed a lot of it when I was...asleep. Anyway...um... He was, like, beating me up, which you know about. And I passed out. As far as anyone knows, he carried on doing so until you stopped him. Which is when he started on you.

"When I came to, I couldn't see anything because my fucking face was all messed up, but I could hear you screaming and that twat grunting. So I tried to get up, and I fell over about three thousand times before I managed to crawl around like a fucking imbecile. I could see a little then, and I started screaming and screaming for help, because he wouldn't stop, and you were unconscious by now, and I couldn't stop him. I tried, Frankie. Really, I did. ...So, anyway. This man came, and he stole my fucking cell phone. Can you fucking believe it? Some people... But one woman, she saw this guy taking our stuff, and she saw the guy beating you up. She came, and she tripped the thief over, but he just got back up. He chucked the cell at her, though, so he must have felt bad or been scared or something. And she called 911, and...

"I said that I didn't want to press charges against the other man...that was later, the police have been talking to me... And the ambulance came, and that lady and I stayed with you the whole time, and I was talking to you...and...and... She said to the paramedic, that she thought I was in shock, because I didn't stop talking at all, and I was just talking shit. But really, Frankie... I just couldn't stand to leave you. I didn't want you to feel alone. I hope you didn't, even if you couldn't hear me.

"And then...you died, Frankie. You died. For eight whole minutes. They did CPR, and they had these paddles, and it really...I kept trying to hold your hand on the ambulance, but they wouldn't let me touch you because of the electric current. But I was in shock, and I had a concussion, so I was kinda delirious...I kept kicking and screaming for you to come back, and I was sure what they were doing was...was k-killing-killing you, so I...I kept fighting. The paramedics sedated me: that's what the nurse said. And when I woke up, I was alone in this room...there were flowers on the table, and my cell was there too.

"Mikey had left me a note; he'd been to see me, he had to go to work, he loved me and he'd told mom and dad...it said I'd be okay and that he'd visit later...and the letter told me where you were, too. You were still in the ICU then, waiting for surgery. I was only out for just under a day. It hurt, I remember that, and I was shit scared about you. You looked... When I found you, you looked like shit. It was awful. You look so much better now, but you're still so...so different. At least you look like you again; it was horrendous before: you were so bruised and swollen and just- ugh! It was awful...to see you like that..."

I don't know what to say anymore. He can't even hear me. It's a waste of time. Everything's a waste of time.

"I love you, Frankie."

I want something to happen, then. I want him to wake up. He doesn't. It doesn't get better, it doesn't change.

"You should never have saved me. This is all my fault. I'm sorry, Frankie. I really do love you. I'm so sorry..."

That's when I seriously expect something to happen. Maybe he'll wake up and smile and everything will be okay and he'll love me and and and and

Nothing changes. Everything stays the same. The sadness will never end.

**A/N: Poor Gee, right?! I don't know whether to leave it here, or write like an epilogue or something. I don't know. Sad endings are sad but happy endings are dorky. So tell me! Feedback would be nice...tell me what to do, bitches! :-D**


	13. You Can Run Away with Me

**XIII: You Can Run Away With Me**

**(3rd person)**

**2 years later**

It happened. He woke up. He was unconscious for a month, and he _died twice_. For a total of seventeen minutes and twenty eight seconds. But he woke up. And he got better. And they healed, together. Gerard said Frank should break up with him, because he believed it was his fault Frankie had gotten so sick. But it wasn't his fault. It was the psycho's fault. And Frank knew this. And they got better together. Everything is okay. It's going to be okay now. Forever.

"I love you," one of them whispers, neither is sure who, as their voices are a tangled mass caught in between their entwined bodies. The other one echoes the gesture, methodical but brutally honest. It's true. It's dorky and cliché and predictable, but it's true. They're in love. They really are.

Gerard is on the left; Frank is on the right. That's how it always is, no matter where they are: Frank's room at his mom's, or his dad's, or in Gerard and Ray's shared apartment, or in the van...it's awkward in the van. Two years have passed: it's 2003: school is gone, forever, and the bullying can't get them anymore; they have a band, and the album is out, and they just got back from touring. There are highs: they're with each other, and their friends, and everything is okay. But there are lows, too, a lot of lows. They all get depressed, a lot of the time. Gee drinks and, well, they all drink, but Gerard is definitely the worst. But...he doesn't have bulimia anymore, either. They do drugs. That isn't healthy. But it's healthier than they would be apart. And they're getting better. Eventually, they will be complete, and there will be no lows, only highs. Until then, they have each other.

Right now, they are on a high, and there weren't even any drugs involved in making it that way. They're in Gee's apartment, in his room, laying together, entangled, with the video game paused. A zombie is in the process of being killed on the TV screen. The graphics are all blurry and shit.

"We could...we could leave, y'know," whispers Frank, right into Gerard's ear. "We could run away, leave it all behind. Your parents, the drink, the coke, the prescription meds...it would all be gone. We could make it go away. Be in complete control of our own lives. Just be together, forever, with no interruptions, no..." He trails off, imagining it. Gee shakes his head, giggles, starts to hum.

He progresses to singing softly, his quiet murmur tickling Frank's neck: "_Hand in mine into your icy blues, and then I'd say to you..._"

Frankie continues, grinning earnestly, "_We could take to the highway..._"

There's a moment of half-silence while they sing in their heads, but they shatter it, impeccably synchronised, by whispering hoarsely, "_I'd end my days with you, in a hail of bullets!_"

Gerard sings the rest of the song, and Frankie hums the melody, tapping the drum part out onto his boyfriend's thigh. As the song draws to a close, Gee closes his eyes, and Frankie hums _Romance_ to him. It's the perfect lullaby: Gerard is asleep before the short tune finishes. Frank lays there, silently watching him, listening to him first breathe quietly, then noisily, then progress into a full-on snore, his mouth wide open. It makes Frank chuckle. "I love you," he says aloud, with no one to hear, and he kisses Gerard right on the lips. It's dry and chapped and delicious, and he kisses him again, despite the fact that he's sleeping. This goes on for about five minutes before Gerard finally wakes up.

"I love you too," murmurs Gee, but he's silenced by Frank's lips. "Mmm...mmm! Frankie!"

This is...new. And it is beautiful. They're experimenting, exploring, neither of them knowing exactly how to do any of this. They can learn together, do everything together, realise and understand and grow up together. They'll get sick together and heal together and, if they wanted to, they could be together for the rest of their lives. It seems like they realise this as they kiss, soft and gentle, then fiery and passionate, their faces moulding together, lips crushing one another. It's weird, the sensation of it. But they like it. Both of them adore it. And they plan to continue adoring it...well, forever.


End file.
